INTERNATIONAL

Bayer Confirms Sheep Deal: German chemical group Bayer confirmed reports that it had signed an agreement with Pharmaceutical Proteins Ltd. to extract a valuable protein from genetically engineered sheep. A company official said Bayer would pay $17.8 million to PPL, a Scottish-based venture capital company, over the next six to seven years for the development of the protein, alpha-1-antitrypsin, or AAT. So far, one sheep has been genetically engineered by the injection of a piece of human genetic material into a newly fertilized sheep egg. The human material instructs the sheep to produce the AAT protein in her milk. Michael Diehl of Bayer’s health policy department said it would take at least six years before the protein could reach the market. Most humans produce AAT naturally but one in 2,000 suffers from a lack of it, causing a risk of emphysema or liver failure.