A researcher at National Taiwan University has cloned six dairy cows due to be born later this year, local media reports said yesterday.
Cheng Deng-gui (
Dolly was created using the genetic information in an adult sheep cell. The resulting fetus was implanted in a sheep's uterus and brought to term.
Cheng's research -- a first for Taiwan -- was made public during a conference on genetics at the Academia Sinica on Friday. Keynote speaker and molecular biologist Shen Che-kun (沈哲鯤) mentioned Cheng's research, which Cheng said he had not planned to make public until it had been successfully completed.
The cows are due to be born in July or August this year, he said. There is still a possibility that the cows may miscarry or that the cloned animals may not have complete genetic information, he said.
Since Dolly was cloned in 1996 and introduced to the world in 1997, scientists around the world have made rapid advances in cloning animals.
Earlier this year, a team of researchers in Japan and the US announced that they had successfully cloned bulls for the first time using adult cells. Later that month, they announced they were able to successfully clone the cloned animals.
Mice and monkeys have also been cloned, although using different techniques from that used for Dolly.
Shen, who is director of the Academia Sinica's institute for molecular biology, predicted during his speech on Friday that humans could be cloned within 10 years.
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