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Cancer-sniffing puppies, cloned from the same litter, cozy up on a blanket at Seoul National University in this undated photo. / Courtesy of RNL Bio |
By Jane Han
Staff Reporter
Less than three years after cloning the world's first dog, a Korean biotechnology company said Monday it successfully cloned four canines that can sniff out human cancer cells.
The cloning team of RNL Bio, led by Seoul National University (SNU) professor Lee Byeong-chun, in April implanted into a surrogate mother cloned fetuses from a black retriever named Marine, a widely-recognized cancer-sniffing dog trained in Japan.
``The four black retrievers were born on May 28,'' Ra Jeong-chan, president of RNL Bio, told reporters. They were named as Marine-R, Marine-N, Marine-L and Marine-S.
Marine, who is six and half years old, is unable to reproduce because her womb was removed from disease.
RNL Bio says the four retrievers will be sent to Japan after three months to join the training program for cancer detection.
Each cloned dog will be priced at 500 million won ($480,000), the company said.
Researchers worldwide have been investigating whether dogs have the ability to detect breast, prostate, lung and skin cancer at a treatable stage.
Experts say cancer cells give off a scent that is not present in healthy cells, which can be detected by dogs in breath or urine samples.
Before the latest breakthrough, RNL Bio recently recreated seven drug-sniffing dogs last year at the request of the Korea Customs Service.
Prior to this, the team cloned the world's first commercial dog ordered by a California woman, who wanted her dead pitbull terrier cloned. The company said in February that it planned to charge $150,000.
The SNU team created the world's first cloned dog, an Afghan hound named Snuppy, who was cloned in 2005. RNL Bio was granted the exclusive license of the technology SNU. The firm plans to expand its dog cloning business to the world market.
jhan@koreatimes.co.kr
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