South Korea's top university said yesterday its researchers' claims to have created the world's first cloned wolves are genuine, even though their paperwork was poor.
Seoul National University, still smarting from an earlier cloning scandal, had set up an inquiry after mistakes in an academic paper by the research team were pointed out.
The team, led by Seoul National University veterinary professors Lee Byung-chun and Shin Nam-shik, announced on March 26 it had cloned two female wolves named Snuwolf -- an acronym for Seoul National University wolf -- and Snuwolffy in October 2005.
Lee was also a leading member of the team led by now-disgraced scientist Hwang Woo-suk that produced the world's first cloned dog in early 2005.
The paper on wolf cloning was found to contain incorrect details in a table analysing the mitochondrial DNA sequence of the wolves and their surrogate mother dogs.
The university secured blood and cell samples from three wolves -- the one that provided eggs and the two clones -- as well as from one of the two dogs which also provided eggs for the research.
"DNA analyses by two research institutions showed that the two wolves are clones," Kuk Young, head of the six-member inquiry panel, told journalists.
Kuk said the inaccurate details in the table and another error were "inadvertent mistakes" and not aimed at exaggerating the team's success.
But the panel found that the team did not write a laboratory note when they carried out the research in 2005.
"Materials and documents related to the sampling and analysing of samples were not kept well. It was also found that [the team] lacked the ability to systematically analyze [the research results]," the panel said in a statement.
It said the university would strengthen screening of research papers, focusing on "their academic value rather than news value," before going public with them.
Hwang was hailed as a national hero until a university inquiry ruled in 2005 that some of his work on cloning embryonic human stem cells was fake. He is now on trial.
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