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Cloning and Genetically Modified Organisms

3 Pages 712 Words November 2014

?Cloning is the duplication of an organism or one cell by transferring the nucleus from the original and placing it into a similar organism or cell of an an extremely young age (i.e. an egg) to make it synthesise the same proteins in order to obtain an exact identical copy of the original organism or cell. This is a very advanced process that has only become possible within the last five or ten years, and it is extremely experimental. That means there are some pros and cons. Some positives are that are organ replacement for individuals with damaged body parts, a substitution for natural reproduction if an individual is infertile, or obtaining specific traits to avoid genetic defects. The negatives are that are that it is a detriment to genetic diversity by creating exact copies of the original, an invitation to malpractices by cloning harmful genetic information, expensive costs might make it impossible for a normal person, or the fact that cloning humans is an attempt to emulate God and create other humans. This will lessen the value of life itself, and could also cause unseen genetic problems no one can foresee or comprehend. One specific example is reproductive cloning. Dolly the sheep was the first mammal to be successfully cloned from an adult cell. Using Nuclear Transfer, it removed the Nucleus from a female’s egg and replaces it with a nucleus from a different animal from the same species. Then they place the egg in the uterus of a third animal. Another example is stem cell cloning, embryonic stem cells can be grown to produce organs or tissues to repair or replace damaged ones. Diseases such as Alzheimer's, Parkinson’s, heart, and degenerative joint disease could be cured using this technology.
Cloning and genetically modified organisms(GMOs) are related because one of the methods used to produce GMOs is reproductive cloning. GMOs are organisms whose genome has been engineered in the laboratory, to express the desired physi...

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