Human cloning, is it really possible in the future?

Cloning is the process of taking genetic information from a living thing to create an identical copy of it. Perhaps you can think of cloning as a color photocopy. Geneticists have successfully cloned cells, tissues, genes, and even living animals. Will human cloning be possible in the future?

Check out some of the interesting facts below about cloning that you may never have known before.

1. Dolly the Sheep is not the first cloned animal in the world

The history of cloning actually started more than 50 years ago. The first animal to be cloned was a sea urchin in 1880 by a researcher named Hans Driesch.

Fast forward a few years later, the first cloned live mammal was finally put on display to the public eye in 1997. Who doesn't know Dolly the Sheep? Dolly was actually born on July 5, 1996 in Scotland. Dolly was cloned using single cells taken from donor sheep.

The Finn Dorset sheep breed has a life span of up to 12 years, but Dolly was forced to be euthanized in 2003 due to chronic lung disease and premature arthritis. However, Dolly's cloned sisters: Debbie, Denise, Dianna, and Daisy are still alive today.

Seeing the success of Dolly's cloning, more and more researchers are competing to create cloned animals.

A team of researchers produces cows, sheep, chickens, all of which have identical genetic codes by transferring nuclei of cells taken from donor embryos to eggs that have been emptied of the nucleus.

In North Korea, researchers have successfully cloned cells from Chase, a retired bloodhound, and have produced an army of six powerful bloodhounds to work in the police force since 2009.

2. Orange is a cloned fruit

Some plants and single-celled organisms such as bacteria produce genetically identical offspring through the process of asexual reproduction. In asexual reproduction, a new individual is produced from a copy of a single cell from the parent organism.

Did you know that citrus fruits are actually cloned? One citrus variety called the navel orange has a protrusion at the base of the orange, which is similar to a human navel. This bulge is actually the residue of the second fruit growing. All navel orange trees are cloned from one another.

Navel oranges do not have seeds, which means they cannot reproduce on their own. That means navel orange trees only need to be grafted from one another to create a new tree.

3. Cloning does not always look like twins

Clones don't always look the same. Although clones share the same genetic material with donors, the environment also plays a large role in how organisms are ultimately formed.

For example, the first cloned cat, Cc, is a female Calico cat that has a very different appearance from its mother. This is because the color and pattern of a cat's coat is not directly affected by genetics.

The phenomenon of deactivating the X chromosome in a female cat (which has two pairs) determines the color of her coat - for example, orange, or black and white. The distribution of the X chromosome deactivation that occurs randomly throughout the body determines the appearance of the overall coat pattern.

For example the cat has dark orange fur on some sides while also having a white or bright orange stripe all over its body.

4. But, twins are the result of human cloning

Human cloning is often said to be an impossible thing to do, at least for the next few decades. But this is not really the case.

Cloning is basically an individual who has an identical genetic code. Identical twins are cloned because they share nearly identical DNA chains and genetic codes.

Usually, after the sperm and egg have met, the fertilized cells will begin dividing in groups of two, four, eight, 16, and so on.

These cells over time develop into organs and organ systems that produce one fetus in one pregnancy. Sometimes, after the first division, these two cells continue to separate and then grow into two individuals with the exact same genetic code - identical twins, aka clones.

The process of human cloning experienced by identical twins is an inviolable will of nature, although it is still not certain what causes it. So, what about artificial human cloning, which must go through laboratory procedures? Is this possible?

5. Human cloning, can it be done?

In December 2002, the first human clone, a baby girl named Eve, was claimed to have been created by Clonaid. Clonaid also claims to have succeeded in creating the first baby boy through cloning, whose network was allegedly taken from a child who died in a car accident.

Despite constant pressure from the research community and the media, Clonaid was never able to prove the existence of the two babies or the 12 other human clones that were said to have been made.

In 2004, a research group led by Woo-Suk Hwang of Seoul National University in South Korea published a paper in the journal Science in which he claimed to have created cloned human embryos in a test tube.

However, an independent scientific committee later found no evidence to support the claim and in January 2006, the journal Science announced that Hwang's paper had been withdrawn.

From a technical point of view, cloning humans and other primates will be more difficult than mammals. One reason is that in primate eggs there are two important proteins for cell division known as spindle proteins.

Spindle proteins are located very close to chromosomes in primate eggs. As a result, removing the egg nucleus to make room for the donor nucleus will also remove the spindle protein. This so interferes with the process of cell division.

In other mammals, such as cats, rabbits, or mice, the two spindle proteins are distributed throughout the egg. Thus, removal of the egg nucleus does not result in loss of spindle protein. In addition, some of the dyes and ultraviolet light used to remove egg nuclei can damage primate cells and prevent them from growing.