Dog tricks

THE SCIENTISTS IN SOUTH KOREA who cloned one live dog out of 1,000 expensive attempts say they only mean to make a better medical-research dog. Of course, researchers can’t regularly, if ever, afford million-dollar (or multimillion-dollar) lab-cloned animals, though individual billionaires with a favorite mutt certainly could. So it’s no surprise that the most enthusiastic reaction came from a flagging company formed to clone beloved pets.

Researchers also were quiet because the relationship between humans and dogs is unique, and the use of dogs in experimentation is like waving a flag at protesters. Mediagenic clones like the now world-famous Snuppy would multiply the outrage. So what, exactly, are we supposed to celebrate with this success?

The Seoul National University scientists who produced the eponymous Afghan hound previously produced 30 cloned human embryos for stem cell research. Another South Korean stem cell researcher critically observed that cloning a full human being would be easier than making another Snuppy because it is much harder to harvest and keep alive dog eggs and embryos. That is a goal strongly rejected by the Seoul National researchers, but a worry that’s unlikely to go away.

The lead Seoul National researcher, Woo Suk Hwang, has been hailed as a champion cloner, with success from lab rats to a cloned pig strain that could suppress rejection of pig organs by humans. Now he’s a father of sorts to the no-doubt well-loved Snuppy. It’s a tour de force for its difficulty. But is it really anything else? We hope not.