Group items tagged

Cloning animal models of disease Much of what researchers learn about human disease comes from studying animal models such as mice. Often, animal models are genetically engineered to carry disease-causing mutations in their genes.

To clone or not to clone: that is the question. The prospect of cloning humans is highly controversial and raises a number of ethical, legal and social challenges that need to be considered.

What is a Clone

In biology, a clone is a cell or an organism that is genetically identical to another cell or organism.

How was Dolly Created? Dolly is different. She was generated from a specialized adult cell, not from an unspecialized embryonic cell.

Professor Julian Savulescu said that creating so-called designer babies could be considered a "moral obligation" as it makes them grow up into "ethically better children". The expert in practical ethics said that we should actively give parents the choice to screen out personality flaws in their children as it meant they were then less likely to "harm themselves and others". The academic, who is also editor-in-chief of the Journal of Medical Ethics, made his comments in an article in the latest edition of Reader's Digest. He explained that we are now in the middle of a genetic revolution and that although screening, for all but a few conditions, remained illegal it should be welcomed.