

To date, however, reproductive cloning has not been successful in primates. Since the creation of Dolly, other types of animals have been cloned using this method, including mice, rats, cats, dogs, goats, deer, cows, mules, and horses. Cloning Dolly required significant effort success was achieved only after 276 previous attempts by the same group resulted in failure. If truly a clone, the offspring would have to be purely white-faced (which was also verified by DNA analysis).
#SHROUD OF TURIN DNA SKIN#
In the creation of Dolly, the scientists used a very clever strategy to monitor their success: the skin cell containing the DNA to be transferred was taken from a type of sheep that was purely white-faced the host egg cell into which this nucleus was transplanted was from a black-faced animal. Since the only source of nuclear DNA in the developing embryo is from the adult cell, the resulting offspring will be genetically identical to the organism from which it was taken. The egg cell is then implanted into a surrogate mother, who also receives various hormones to simulate the normal course of pregnancy. The nucleus of adult cell (a skin cell, for example) is isolated and transplanted into an egg cell (oocyte), which has had its own nucleus removed. The basics of this method are shown in the figure below. Development of the SCNT technique began in the early 1950s using frogs, and was further refined and eventually popularized in the mainstream media years later with the success of Dolly, a cloned sheep, in 1996. Somatic cells are cells other than sex cells (sperm or egg), which under normal circumstances do not provide DNA in the generation of an organism. Several types of cloning exist, but the most germane to the discussion of the Shroud is reproductive cloning using a method known as somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT). Just how realistic is this scenario? What would be required to accomplish the cloning of a person under such circumstances? Would a clone be an exact duplicate of the Turin Shroud man? These and related issues are discussed below.Ĭloning is the creation of an identical genetic copy of a living organism.
#SHROUD OF TURIN DNA SERIES#
There has also been an Outer Limits television series episode, and a feature film released in 2010, “I’m not Jesus, Mommy”, centered on this idea. Search on and you will find over twenty fiction novels based on this premise include those available exclusively as e-books and you can add about ten more. The subject of a recent blog post about a comic book series that is now into its fifth issue, Punk Rock Jesus, involves a rather popular storyline regarding the Shroud: using DNA extracted from bloodstained threads to clone Jesus.

The Media’s Hyperbole with the Double Helix
