To Resurrect or Leave in the Past
Humans are curious by nature; they often ask themselves what if I would have lived in pre-historic times or in some cases during a different period of time. There is s specific reason as to why they are living in the specific period they were born. Could it be the theory of evolution or a product of religious faith? No one can be for certain what the correct answer is. One thing is for certain though; scientists have now discovered a process called cloning in which they resurrect extinct animals and even humans. Scientists have raised quit a controversy with the talk of cloning a wooly mammoth. In the article, Recipe for a Resurrection: bringing extinct species back to life is no longer considered science fiction. But is it a good idea? Scientists have discovered how to clone animals such as mice after they have been frozen for sixteen years. Much of the basic information was established weeks later when a group from Pennsylvania State University published 70 percent of the mammoth gene. As a result of their research, scientists now believe they can effectively clone a wooly mammoth. Even though scientists believe they can effectively clone a wooly mammoth they are struggling with the ethical dilemma this poses. The next step of the process would be to recover the DNA sequence to reproduce the wooly mammoth. According to Mueller (2009), scientists would have to recover the complete DNA sequence and show this data in an organism. The remaining genome would have to be recovered and resequenced. The DNA would then need to be organized in the chromosomes. Since, the mammoths DNA is too fragmented to use, Mueller (2009), suggests modifying the chromosomes of an African and Asian elephant, which are the closest living relative to a wooly mammoth.
By default the elephants genetic make-up would be re-wrote into that of a wooly mammoth. Another possibility the scientist have, is to synthesize the entire genome if researchers can determine how the DNA was organized in the chromosomes. If, scientists are successful creating the chromosomes of the wooly mammoth the next step would be to create an artificial nucleus cell. Next, scientists could follow the example of Dolly the sheep, which was cloned in 1996; scientists would then transfer an embryo into an elephant’s womb for gestation. Although this sounds simple enough there are still some grey areas with this research. Scientists are still struggling with how to build a nucleus as well as how well the elephant would carry a wooly mammoth through the gestation period. These steps pose many questions for scientists therefore; some scientists have begun with smaller challenges. Scientists from Advanced Cell technologies and the San Diego Zoo have successfully cloned across the species barrier. “Frozen