Copy cat

WHY SHOULD a cat settle for nine lives when it can have endless lives--at least, so to speak, with the help of researchers at Texas A&M University's College of Veterinary Medicine. That's where the first-ever cloned domestic cat was born in December.

The fuzzy kitten, named "cc"--for copycat or carbon copy--is a genetic clone of Rainbow, a 2-year-old calico (tri-colored) female. "A genetic clone has the exact same genes [hereditary information] as its genetic donor," says Dr. Duane Kraemer, a veterinarian on the cloning team.

To clone Rainbow, DNA (genetic information) was removed from the ova, or egg cells, of an adult cat named Allie, cc's surrogate (substitute) mother. Scientists then removed DNA from the nucleus (center) of several cells drawn from Rainbow and transferred each nucleus into an egg from Allie. The process, called nuclear transfer, activates the egg cells. Then they begin to divide to form an embryo, an unborn baby in the early weeks of development.

Cc may be Rainbow's genetic twin, but the two have different coat patterns. Why? "Copycat isn't a perfect copy of Rainbow and wasn't expected to be," Kraemer explains. Genes alone don't control an animal's coat color--environmental factors also strongly influence an individual's makeup. "A clone just replicates the genetics of an individual," says Kraemer.

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