Snuppy (born April 24, 2005) is an
Afghan houndThe Afghan Hound is a very old sighthound dog breed. Distinguished by its thick, fine, silky coat and its tail with a ring curl at the end, the breed acquired its unique features in the cold mountains of Afghanistan, where it was originally used to hunt hares, and gazelles by coursing them. Its...
, credited with being the world's first
clonedCloning in biology is the process of producing populations of genetically-identical individuals that occurs in nature when organisms such as bacteria, insects or plants reproduce asexually. Cloning in biotechnology refers to processes used to create copies of DNA fragments , cells , or organisms...
dogThe dog is a domesticated form of the Gray Wolf, a member of the Canidae family of the order Carnivora. The term is used for both feral and pet varieties. The domestic dog has been one of the most widely kept working and companion animals in human history...
. The puppy was created using the
cellThe cell is the basic structural and functional unit of all known living organisms. It is the smallest unit of an organism that is classified as living, and is often called the building block of life. The Alberts text discusses how the "cellular building blocks" move to shape developing embryos...
of an ear from an adult Afghan hound and involved 123 surrogate mothers, of which only three produced pups (Snuppy being the sole survivor). The team of 45 responsible for cloning Snuppy was led by
biomedical scientistA biomedical scientist , is a scientist educated in the field of biological science, especially in the context of medicine...
Hwang Woo-SukHwang Woo-suk is a South Korean veterinarian researcher. He was a professor of theriogenology and biotechnology at Seoul National University who became infamous for fabricating a series of experiments, which appeared in high profile journals, in the field of stem cell research...
, who was later found to have lied about his research; the investigators discovered that the only aspect of Hwang's research that was true was that Snuppy was a clone.
Snuppy (born April 24, 2005) is an
Afghan houndThe Afghan Hound is a very old sighthound dog breed. Distinguished by its thick, fine, silky coat and its tail with a ring curl at the end, the breed acquired its unique features in the cold mountains of Afghanistan, where it was originally used to hunt hares, and gazelles by coursing them. Its...
, credited with being the world's first
clonedCloning in biology is the process of producing populations of genetically-identical individuals that occurs in nature when organisms such as bacteria, insects or plants reproduce asexually. Cloning in biotechnology refers to processes used to create copies of DNA fragments , cells , or organisms...
dogThe dog is a domesticated form of the Gray Wolf, a member of the Canidae family of the order Carnivora. The term is used for both feral and pet varieties. The domestic dog has been one of the most widely kept working and companion animals in human history...
. The puppy was created using the
cellThe cell is the basic structural and functional unit of all known living organisms. It is the smallest unit of an organism that is classified as living, and is often called the building block of life. The Alberts text discusses how the "cellular building blocks" move to shape developing embryos...
of an ear from an adult Afghan hound and involved 123 surrogate mothers, of which only three produced pups (Snuppy being the sole survivor). The team of 45 responsible for cloning Snuppy was led by
biomedical scientistA biomedical scientist , is a scientist educated in the field of biological science, especially in the context of medicine...
Hwang Woo-SukHwang Woo-suk is a South Korean veterinarian researcher. He was a professor of theriogenology and biotechnology at Seoul National University who became infamous for fabricating a series of experiments, which appeared in high profile journals, in the field of stem cell research...
, who was later found to have lied about his research; the investigators discovered that the only aspect of Hwang's research that was true was that Snuppy was a clone. Snuppy has since been used in the first known successful breeding between cloned canines, after his sperm was used to artificially inseminate two cloned females, which resulted in the birth of 10 puppies in 2008. Replacement team leader and vetinarian Lee Byung-Chun has suggested this technology makes it possible to replicate sterilized working dogs.
History
After Dolly the sheep was cloned in 1996, scientists had managed to clone numerous other animals, including cats, cows,
gaurThe gaur is a large, dark-coated bovine animal of South Asia and Southeast Asia. The biggest populations are found today in India. The gaur is the largest species of wild cattle, bigger than the Cape buffalo, water buffalo and bison...
, horses, mice, mules, pigs, rabbits and rats but had been unable to successfully clone a dog due to the problematic task of maturing a canine
ovumAn ovum is a haploid female reproductive cell or gamete. Both animals and embryophytes have ova. The term ovule is used for the young ovum of an animal, as well as the plant structure that carries the female gametophyte and egg cell and develops into a seed after fertilization...
in an artificial environment. After several failed attempts by other scientists, Woo-Suk Hwang, a professor of
Seoul National UniversitySeoul National University , colloquially known in Korean as Seoul-dae , is a national research university located in Seoul, ranked 24th in the world in publications in an analysis of data from the Science Citation Index and 47th in the world and 7th in Asia by THES-QS World University Rankings...
, and a team of other scientists were able to successfully create a clone using
tissueTissue may refer to:* Tissue , a group of biological cells that perform a similar function* Tissue moth, the geometer moth Triphosa dubitata* Tissue paper, a type of thin, translucent paper used for wrapping and cushioning items...
from the ear of a 3-year-old Afghan hound.
123 surrogate mothers were used to carry the embryos, of which 1,095 were implanted, the procedure resulted in only three pregnancies; one resulted in a miscarriage, the other pup was born successfully but died of
pneumoniaPneumonia is an inflammatory illness of the lung. Frequently, it is described as lung parenchyma/alveolar inflammation and abnormal alveolar filling with fluid ....
three weeks after birth, the successful clone was carried by a
golden labradorThe Labrador Retriever is one of several kinds of retriever, a type of gun dog. The Labrador, once known as the Lesser Newfoundland, is the most popular breed of dog in the world, and is by a large margin the most popular breed by registration in Canada, the United States ,and the United Kingdom.It...
. From the original 1,095 embryos to the final two puppies, this placed the success rate of the project at less than two tenths of a percent. Snuppy was named as a portmanteau of the initials of the Seoul National University (SNU) and the word "puppy".
Process
As the eggs in a female canine are only fertile during the estrus phase of the
estrous cycleThe estrous cycle comprises the recurring physiologic changes that are induced by reproductive hormones in most mammalian placental females. Humans undergo a menstrual cycle instead...
, the eggs could only be harvested during a three-week period each year. Due to complexities with removing eggs from canine ovaries the eggs had to be extracted from the
oviductIn oviparous animals , the passage from the ovaries to the outside of the body is known as the oviduct. The eggs travel along the oviduct...
, which required constant monitoring to achieve. The nucleus of each egg was replaced with the cell from the ear of the adult dog and then electrified and fused using a chemical reaction. The embryos were then transferred to the surrogate dogs. Three of the surrogate mothers became pregnant and two successfully gave birth. Snuppy, the first to be born, survived while the other died two weeks after birth.
Reaction
Snuppy was named as Time Magazine's
"Most Amazing Invention" of the year in 2005. Particular recognition was given to the cloning technique used in the process, which Time stated was "embodied by a history-making puppy". Despite numerous labs performing mammalian cloning, they cited that Hwang's team and Snuppy were "extraordinary". The experiment was criticised by Robert Klitzman, co-director of Columbia University's Center for Bioethic, who cited that the process raised the question of if humans are "just a mass of cells and biological processes?" Hwang himself criticised the process, stating that it did not bring science any closer to human cloning and the complexities, coupled with the low success rate (one in 123), did not make it ethical to clone family pets.
Ian WilmutSir Ian Wilmut, OBE is an English embryologist and is currently one of the leaders of the Queen's Medical Research Institute at the University of Edinburgh. He is best known as the leader of the research group that in 1996 first cloned a mammal from an adult somatic cell, a Finnish Dorset lamb...
, the scientist behind the successful cloning of Dolly the sheep, said that the successful cloning of Snuppy proved that any mammal could be cloned in the correct environments and that a global ban on human cloning needed to be quickly implemented because of this.
The Kennel ClubThe Kennel Club is a kennel club based in London and Aylesbury, England.Founded on 4 April, 1873, the club is the oldest of the world’s all-breed kennel clubs. It is the governing body for dogs in the UK and its primary objective is 'to promote in every way, the general improvement of dogs'...
criticised the entire concept of dog cloning, on the grounds that their mission is to "To promote in every way the general improvement of dogs" and no improvement can occur if replicas are being created.
Controversy
Between late 2005-2006 Hwang was accused of a series of misconducts. The first allegations related to his work prior to Snuppy; the claim that he had successfully cloned a human embryo. The charges alleged Hwang had paid for egg donations and that some of eggs came from his employees, which constitute serious breaches of the code of
bioethicsBioethics is the philosophical study of the ethical controversies brought about by advances in biology and medicine. Bioethicists are concerned with the ethical questions that arise in the relationships among life sciences, biotechnology, medicine, politics, law, philosophy, and theology.- History...
. It was later found that photographs he published did not depict what was suggested and that most of the stem-cell lines he claimed to have created were not clones at all. This brought serious doubts onto the validity of Snuppy, which Hwang consistently claimed was a genuine clone. Hwang hired HumanPass Inc., a Korean DNA lab to investigate Snuppy, who found that Snuppy was authentic. The findings by HumanPass were dismissed on the grounds that they were employed by Hwang and a panel at the Seoul National University ordered their own investigation. The investigation found that, despite his fabrications in previous projects, Hwang's research related to Snuppy was accurate and Snuppy was a clone of the adult Afghan hound. As a result of his forgeries, Hwang was indicted for fraud and dismissed from the university.
Subsequent developments
After Hwang Woo-Suk was dismissed from the university, veterinary professor Lee Byung-Chun took over leadership of the team behind Snuppy. In 2008, Snuppy became involved in the first known successful breeding between cloned canines, after sperm taken from Snuppy was used to artificially inseminate two cloned females, which resulted in the birth of 10 puppies. Nine of the puppies survived. The SNU team, under Lee, have gone on to successfully clone over 30 dogs and five wolves. After successfully breeding the cloned wolves, Lee claimed that the ability to breed cloned canines makes it possible for
working dogA working dog refers to a canine working animal, i.e. a type of dog that is not merely a pet but learns and performs tasks to assist and/or entertain its human companions, or a breed of such origin...
s which are usually sterilised before training, such as sniffer dogs and
guide dogGuide dogs are assistance dogs trained to lead blind or vision impaired people around obstacles.Although the dogs can be trained to navigate various obstacles, they are partially color blind and are not capable of interpreting street signs. The human half of the guide dog team does the directing,...
s, to reproduce. SNU, which claims to own the patent for the process used to clone Snuppy, formed a license agreement with RNL Bio, a commercial pet cloning company. Hwang entered into a partnership with RNL Bio's competitor; BioArts International, which caused an on-going legal battle into who owns the patent rights. RNL completed the first commercial cloning in August 2008.
The worlds first cloned sniffer dogs (all of which are named
ToppyToppy is the name of the world's first cloned working dogs....
) were put to work by South Korea customs in July 2009.