While the debate over the ethics of cloning rages on, countries and companies with no interest in the morality of the science are already using clones to fill their needs. One country doing so is South Korea, who is now training cloned dogs for drug patrols.

Cloning is an inexact science, still in its infancy, and is shackled by ethical issues that are still being battled in the courts and churches around the globe. Ever since the first clone was achieved, Dolly the sheep, people have been leery of using the technology in any way for fear of the stigma attached to it, as well as fear of the unknown implications of clones being introduced into the gene pool.

The dogs being trained for use in South Korea’s anti-drug activity are a set of labrador puppies. All seven labrador retrievers were cloned from one sire. The sire is a star drug sniffing retriever currently still active in the fight against drugs in South Korea.

The cost of a canine for use in drug patrols is prohibitive. One attraction of using cloned dogs is lower costs over all. The lab responsible for the clones is the same lab that brought us Snuppy, the first cloned dog, in 2005: Seoul National University.

All seven of the puppies answer to the Toppy (from the words “tomorrow” and “puppy”), and all seven passed the difficult behavior test required of any canine performing police work. That’s unheard of success. Normally less than 15 percent of dogs pass the temperament test. It is only a first step, though. There is still the agility test and tests for strength, concentration and scenting ability to pass.

The scientist have now cloned 20 dogs over all, plus five wolves. So far they have not asked for payment for any of the animals, since they are all part of their research. They hope to be able to charge for the clones once the procedure becomes more consistent and commonplace.

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Entry was posted on Thursday, April 24th, 2008 at 8:38 pm under Science and technology.

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