Cloned Pet Puppies

If you really love your dog and have about $150,000 to spare, you can now order a clone from Korean biotechnology company RNL Bio. Geneticists revealed earlier today that they have created the first dogs cloned for commercial purposes: five puppies created with DNA from Booger the pit bull terrier. (Dogs have previously been cloned for scientific and government purposes.)

According to the Guardian,

“The five clones cost Bernann McKinney, a Californian-based farmer, £25,000 ($50,000) and were well worth it, she said at a press conference in the South Korean capital, Seoul, where the announcement was made.

“… When Booger got cancer, McKinney had skin cells taken from the dog and preserved in the hope that science would come to her aid. Scientists at Seoul National University used the cells to create embryos, which where [sic] then implanted into two surrogate mother dogs. The puppies were born on July 28.”

RNL Bio, which produced seven clones of Toppie, a drug-sniffing dog, in 2006, and four clones of a cancer-sniffing dog from Japan named Marine in 2007, says that it is also interested in cloning camels for customers in the Middle East.