One of the world leaders in genetics innovation and cloning has
taken another step forward, beginning the development of the world’s largest
cloning factory. The facility (as pictured below) is set to open mid 2016 and focus on producing
cloned cattle embryos for food. When it reaches peak productivity, the facility
will produce up to 1 million cattle embryos, greatly bolstering the Chinese food
industry in a country of over a billion people. This can result in the factory
being responsible for 5% of the cattle market alone.
China
has shown to be one of the least conservative countries when it comes to the
debate of the morality and ethics between cloning and genetic modification,
though sometimes it can’t afford to be conservative. There is a large amount of
low quality beef that farmers already struggle to meet production quotas to
meet the countries overwhelming demands. This cloning factory will ease the
burden on these farmers and put out much higher quality beef. Another problem
being addressed is the inefficiencies of introducing new, more desired, traits
into a population. Typically, if you take a prized bull you would need to breed
it into a population for 3 or 4 generations to produce the generation of bulls
you wanted. With this technology, the genes from this premium bull can be
integrated into the cloning process immediately.
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This is a really scary advancement in science that we will see in our lifetime. Obviously cloning is a huge controversy in society, but there are a lot of ways it can help and harm us. I am extremely hesitant to see where this will lead in the coming years.
ReplyDeleteI think China is a little crazy for thinking that they could create and begin to run a facility like this by mid 2016. I have no idea what sort of advancements they have in cloning there, but it scares me to think about what they are if they are able to open a cloning facility that could create 1 million cattle embryos. I am not one to hold my breathe over something, but this concerns me to a certain degree. Cattle is what they say it is for, but who knows if that is the true motive behind the facility?
ReplyDeleteThis is an amazing advancement, and could possibly end hunger. it is scary if that can be turned to cloning humans, or it could be a good thing depending on who you ask.
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