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On 5 July 1996, Dolly the sheep was born in Scotland, the result of the first successful cloning of a mammal from an adult somatic cell.
Photo: TV Globo / Flipar video playback
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The news was only released in February 1997, when it became news and had repercussions throughout the world.
Photo: Reproduction of newspaper clipping / Flip
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Dolly was cloned by scientists at the Rolin Institute in the UK by extracting a cell from the mammary gland of another sheep.
Photo: TV Globo / Flipar video playback
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A total of 277 embryos were cloned in the experiment, but only Dolly managed to survive.
Photos: – TV Globo / Flipar video playback
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The white face was the feature that made scientists sure that it was indeed a clone, as the sheep that gave birth to Dolly had a black face. Therefore, it turned out that she was just a “surrogate mother”.
Photo: TV Globo / Flipar video playback
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The sheep’s first name was a tribute to American country music singer Dolly Parton.
Photo: TV Globo / Flipar video playback
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Dolly died in 2002, aged six years and seven months, after vets detected a lung infection.
Photo: TV Globo / Flipar video playback
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At the time, Harry Griffin, director of the Roslin Institute, said that the disease that affected Dolly’s lungs was typical of older sheep. Given the rapid progression of the disease, the sheep had to be euthanized by vets.
Photo: Freepik image / Flipar
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The cloning of Dolly has generated intense ethical and scientific debate, a topic that continues to be discussed as the procedure evolves.
Photo: Freepik image / Flipar
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Among the progress achieved by cloning Dolly is the contribution to the discovery of iPS cells (adult cells reprogrammed in the laboratory to regain the properties of embryonic stem cells) by Japanese scientists.
Photo: TV Globo / Flipar video playback
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Embryonic stem cells are those present inside the embryo, capable of transforming into any adult cell.
Photo: – Freepik / Flipar image
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iPS cells, whose discovery earned Japanese doctor Shinya Yamanaka the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 2012, are part of studies on several diseases.
Photo: – Image by Arek Socha from Pixabay / Flipar
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After Dolly was cloned, other mammals were replicated using the same technology. In January 2018, the first two cloned primates, the monkeys Zhong Zhong and Hua Hua, were born in China.
Photo: Freepik image / Flipar
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In this experiment, nearly 150 primate embryos were cloned, and only these two monkeys survived.
Photo: TV Globo / Flipar video playback
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American researchers have managed to clone a black-footed weasel and a Przewalski’s horse, both animals at risk of extinction.
Photo: playback/flip
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In 2013, the scientific journal Cell published a study conducted by a team from Oregon Health and Science University, in the United States, which led to the successful cloning of a human embryo.
Photo: TV Globo / Flipar video playback
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Scientists said the human embryo was produced using similar methods to those used to clone Dolly the sheep.
Photo: Reproduction from Twitter / Flipar
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The experiment transplanted material extracted from adult cells into eggs (with the DNA removed). With an electrical stimulus, unfertilized eggs were induced to transform into embryonic stem cells.
Photo: Squidonio/Wikimédia Commons/Flipar
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One of the creators of Dolly the sheep, British scientist Ian Willmut died in September 2023. The information was released by the University of Edinburgh, Scotland, where he was a professor and patron.
Photo: TV Globo / Flipar playback
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Source: Terra

Ben Stock is a lifestyle journalist and author at Gossipify. He writes about topics such as health, wellness, travel, food and home decor. He provides practical advice and inspiration to improve well-being, keeps readers up to date with latest lifestyle news and trends, known for his engaging writing style, in-depth analysis and unique perspectives.