Eureka or egad? Chinese genetics company makes ‘micro pigs’
BEIJING— Have you been pining for a “teacup” pig but worried that the supposedly petite porcine pet might grow as big as your bathtub?
A Chinese biotech firm says it now has the answer: a genetically modified swine that tops out around 15 kilograms.
BGI, a company based in the southern city of Shenzhen that is known for its work sequencing human, plant and animal DNA, recently announced that it intends to start selling $1,600 miniature pigs that it initially created as laboratory models for studying human ailments.
The pigs created a splash late last month when BGI showed them at the Shenzhen International Biotech Leaders Summit. The pint-size porkers were created through a process known as gene editing. Rather than introduce another organism’s DNA into the pigs, scientists “edit” the swine’s own genetic material, disabling a copy of the growth hormone receptor gene so that cells don’t get a signal to grow.
Swine-loving celebrities will have to wait for further innovation for truly purse-portable pigs (Miley Cyrus’ Bubba Sue and Paris Hilton’s Princess Piglette are more than a handful, while George Clooney’s 18-year companion, Max, grew to 250 pounds before he died in 2006).
But animal breeders and advocates say the prospect of even a 15-kilogram pig could reduce the problem of people abandoning pet swine that pack on the pounds beyond their owners’ expectations. Curt Mills, a board member of the Southern California Association for Miniature Pot-Bellied Pigs, says four regional shelters for the animals are all at capacity, with about 150 oinkers looking for homes.
“Pigs are good pets, but a lot of issue is the size,” said Patty Morrisroe, a pig breeder in Dallas, Ore., who says she has spent 30 years selectively breeding swine to produce pigs she calls “Royal Dandies” and “Dandie Extremes” that can be around 39 pounds full grown. But with just four breeding sows, her litters are limited — about 20 piglets per year — and she charges $2,500 to $5,500 per animal.
“If you could immediately make a small pig, it would be very cool, but there are still a lot of questions,” she said.
Kenneth Bondioli, a professor of animal sciences at Louisiana State University, said BGI’s gene-edited micro pigs would need to be evaluated to see if they develop healthily and to determine whether they could harm the environment or other livestock if they were released or escaped. It is unclear whether BGI intends to offer its pigs for sale outside China, but if Americans wanted them, U.S. regulators would have to determine whether they could be imported.
“If these and other questions are addressed, the fact that they are gene-edited is irrelevant,” Bondioli said.
Researchers say the creation of micro pigs could be a boon for scientists, cutting down on the cost of raising them as laboratory animals and making their care more manageable. “Their utility for research will depend on whether they are otherwise normal like a regular pig and unaffected by the edited gene other than their diminutive size,” said Willard Eyestone, an associate professor of biotechnology at Virginia Tech.
These micro pigs could be useful “especially for long-term studies, during which even currently available ‘mini pigs’ grow to substantial size.”
But Alison Van Eenennaam, a biotechnology specialist at the University of California, Davis who visited BGI about three months ago and saw their micro pigs, said the fact that the company has resorted to marketing them as pets reflects the “global regulatory gridlock” around gene-edited animals for food production and other more serious purposes.
“Genome editing is a powerful technology that can be used for many beneficial applications . . . such as producing disease-resistant animals and other things that would have real benefits for the sustainability of food production,” she said.
But worldwide, she said, no genetically engineered animal for food production has been able to be brought to market, and only a few genetically engineered ani- mal therapeutic products have been approved for humans. That, she believes, is making companies hesitant to invest in the technology.
Bioengineered pets, though, have found easier acceptance. A transgenic fluorescent fish, marketed under the brand GloFish, has been popular for a number of years in the United States. The fish were created by Singaporean researchers who inserted jellyfish and sea anemone genes into zebrafish eggs.
“People are happy to have them in their aquarium, but it’s when it’s on their dinner plate that they have a different attitude,” said Van Eenennaam.
Acompany called AquaBounty has been seeking for more than 20 years to win FDA approval to bring a genetically modified fast-growing salmon to supermarkets. While the AquAdvantage salmon and the GloFish have been engineered to incorporate genes from other fish, the technique used by BGI to create its micro pigs is different and presents a new question for regulatory agencies like the FDA if they were to be imported to the United States. Pigs are technically food animals, said Max Rothschild, an agriculture professor at Iowa State University, and the FDA reserves the right to regulate any genetic modification introduced into such organisms. But in sharp contrast to genetically modified organisms with DNA added into their genomes, he said, the micro pig was made by removing just a few, highly targeted letters of DNA from its own genome.
“The FDA should be grappling with this major difference right now as to how it will affect regulatory policy,” he said, “and whether gene-edited organisms should be regulated in the same way as more traditional GMOs.”