A new idea to make the same old thing: Cloning

Imagine being invaded by millions upon millions of genetically engineered super soldiers, all of
which look exactly the same. They look the same because they have been perfected in every way to be
the optimal killing machines. Scary to think of such a situation outside of a science fiction novel, but
some people seem to think that this could become a reality if cloning research is allowed to proceed into
the future. While one day very far from now this could be a viable concern, it is doubtful that
production of an army through cloning would ever become practical. If ever the technology was
available, the resources such a project would demand would be much greater than simply training
children from birth to be soldiers.

Whether or not cloning armies of super soldiers is something to consider for the future, it is not
worth worrying about because it is not going to be an issue anytime soon. The real problem behind
people who feel that cloning is unethical is that they don’t know what cloning is all about, nor do they
realize the potential it has for good. Just a few benefits cloning could provide are curing diseases,
creating organs, saving animal species, and increasing food supplies. However, before you can begin to
understand how things like this are possible from cloning, it is important to know what cloning is.

Cloning is something that has been taking place for nearly as long as the natural word has
existed. Since a clone is nothing more than an offspring which is genetically identical to the parent,
many things are technically considered clones. A self pollinated plant, an asexually reproducing
bacterium, or even an earthworm that was cut in half, will all result in “cloned” organisms. This,
however, is much different from purposefully creating a clone in the laboratory.

It was only about sixty years ago that the thought of cloning organisms in the lab was nothing
more than science fiction. However when the German
scientist, Hans Spemann, successfully performed the first
somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT) in 1924, a tool was
created to make this thought a reality. In 1952 the first
successful cloning experiment was documented at the Fox
Chase Cancer Research Center in Philadelphia, PA. These
experiments performed by Robert Briggs and Thomas
King paved the way for an intriguing new field of study.
The potential of cloning in the future is almost limitless.
 Generally speaking, cloning is a
biological process which yields individuals
that are genetically identical to the parent.
Performing this in a laboratory was a novel
idea which employed Spemann’s technique
developed nearly 30 years prior. The
experiments performed by Briggs and King
utilized SCNT to clone a frog embryo
successfully in 1952. Simply stated, the goal
of SCNT in cloning is first to remove the
nucleus from an egg cell (in this case a frog’s
egg). Next, replace it with the nucleus from
a blastula cell, in order to see if a normal
embryo developed. The main steps of SCNT
will be described in more detail below, and
are graphically represented in Figure 3.

The process first involves removal of the nucleus from the egg cell. This is achieved by first
pricking the egg with a needle, which causes the egg to orient itself in a way that allows a syringe to
enter the egg cell and extract
the nucleus. The next step is to
inject the enucleated egg cell
with the nucleus from a blastula
cell. This is a complicated
procedure which involves using
a syringe to first draw up a
single blastula cell. Pressure in
the syringe causes the cell wall
to rupture, but at the same
time keep the intracellular
contents intact. The syringe
can then be expelled into the
enucleated egg cell, and because the cell wall had been broken, the blastula nucleus diffuses into its new
home.

The difficulty of the procedure lies in making sure that neither the recipient cell nor the donor
nucleus is damaged before or during the transplant. These concerns were the main reason Briggs and
King chose to use an undifferentiated blastula nucleus for transplantation. Blastula cells are cells
present in the early stages of embryonic development. Before Briggs and King attempted to clone a
completely different cell type, they thought it would be smart to first clone a cell for which the donor
and recipient were equivalent. By using a blastula cell, the end result, assuming no damage had
occurred, would be the formation of a normal frog embryo. From there they could use nuclei of various
cell types in order to see if they could clone any variety of cells.