FREE ESSAY ON CLONING TECHNOLOGIES AND MORE

CLONING TECHNOLOGIES AND MORE

Cloning Technologies and More
Science, in the past few years has made great strides in the field of mammal
reproduction. They've worked for years to find out exactly what happens during a
pregnancy, and also how it works. We've come so far in these stages as to gain the
knowledge needed to make oral contraceptives. However, I am not writing this report to
enlighten you on these subjects, or to debate the ethical issues of them. This report is
focusing on the creation of life, not the destruction of one. Up until a few years ago,
we've only known one way to reproduce, but now, thanks to the research and endless hours
of experiments by those dedicated to finding out if it really is possible another way,
there is a new method of reproduction called cloning. I'm not going to debate the moral
issues of this subject, but rather tell you how it's achieved.
How does it work?
There are two methods of cloning. The first, called embryo cloning, has been achieved
years before in frogs, other amphibians, mammals, and once it was tried with humans,
however both attempts to do this with the humans failed. The second method of cloning is
achieved by using an adult cell, not an embryo. To do this scientists remove an egg cell
from a female, and remove the chromosomes, nucleus, etc, leaving no way for the mother
interfere with the genetic part of the reproduction. However, the parts of the egg cell
needed for cell growth and development are left intact. The cell from an adult mammal is
then taken away from its owner. Being placed in a cure dish, the cell is starved of
nutrients, but is still kept alive. The reason for this: the cell must stop dividing in
order for cloning to take place. The nucleus from this cell is removed. The nucleus and
the egg cell are placed next to each other, and electrical charges are emitted into them.
These electrical charges make the two fuse, or combine together. After about 6 weeks, the
egg cell, now artificially fertilized, is placed back into the uterus of another female
of the same species. Allowed to grow and develop as normal, the baby is born after the
normal amount of time needed to let a baby develop. The result: a physical clone of the
animal.
Some facts about cloning
A friend of yours has an ingenious plan to take a cell from a dead person like Hitler,
clone him, and try to take over the world, with his help. First off, your friend needs
adjustment. Secondly, you couldn't clone him to be the same person, with the same
personality as before. Being placed in a different environment, with different
situations, he would not develop emotionally as he had before. On the contrary, you could
turn him into a little choirboy if placed into the right situations.
So if it's that easy, why doesn't a person like Bill Gates clone him self, just for fun`
or to have a living memoriam of himself when he's gone? It isn't that easy. The United
States have taken steps to ban the cloning of people, passing the bill against it two
years ago. It's also expensive, and Dolly the sheep was successfully cloned after 276
unsuccessful tries.
So does anybody own cloning? Yes, believe it or not. Although the creators of Dolly were
the first to clone an adult mammal, the company that owns the patent is the Massachusetts
company of Advanced Cell Technology (ACT).
A common misconception: clones will NOT have the same DNA as the other animal. A type of
DNA called mitochondrial DNA is not removed from the mother during the fertilization.
This DNA is used for energy production cannot be transferred with the host's nucleus. So,
it also is left intact in the egg cell for the fertilization.
In the present and future of cloning
What may we be expecting from cloning in the future? Try this for size: scientists
recently made the news for cloning the first pigs. And pigs are one of the animals more
closely related to humans....so, I'll let you make your own inference. 
Also, the team at the Roslin Institute has figured out how to make a starved cell able to
reproduce again. Their patent is still pending.
Have you wondered why the team used a sheep to clone? The answer: sheep are closely
related to humans, just as pigs are, and in Scotland, where Dolly was cloned, sheep are
very very very very very cheap.
Some have had ideas of using cloning to bring back extinct species, and, mainly, help the
endangered species go back to how they once were.
Also, there are teams in different places working on ways to clone just organs of mammals
for transplants. However, this is expected to turn out with poor results, because it is
likely that the body will reject these organs, as it would others.
The End
While many believe cloning is an unnecessary evil, others believe it will become a chief
way reproduce crops, or livestock that have favorable qualities about them. I believe
that cloning can be useful in these ways, but very dangerous in others. What I'm saying
is that we're meddling with technologies we don't know much about and further research
should be done to discover what is needed to master this science before we go making our
own species of animals. We are still like novices to this new science, and should respect
it, not toy with it.