South Korean Firm Will Clone Your Pet

Clone your beloved Snookums for a mere $150k

Cloning is a subject of much debate here in the United States, therefore, we don’t hear of the cloning of animals by American scientists much. However, the process of cloning animals is done in other countries.

A Korean company called RNL Bio is working with the scientists who cloned the first canine named Snuppy. The company is offering to clone deceased pets for the tidy sum of $150,000. A company spokeswoman says that the first customer, Bernann McKunney from California, has already signed up to have her dead pit bull cloned.

McKunney says she is particularly attached to the dead animal because it saved her life during an attack by another animal. RNL Bio says that ear tissue from the dog was preserved at a U.S. biotech lab before the animal’s death and that there is about a 25% chance of being able to clone a new animal from this tissue.

The actual cloning of the animal will be done by Seoul National University and led by veterinary professor Dr. Lee Byeong-chun.

Lee worked with the disgraced Hwang Woo-suk who was found to have falsified his research. Lee was in court many times alongside Hwang for allegations of misappropriating funds and was suspended for three months during the stem cell scandal.