Scientists study dog to find possible cure for Atherosclerosis, a heart condition Chinese firm clones gene-edited dog

Beijing, Dec. 26: A China-based biotech company Sinogene, has succeeded in creating a pup cloned from a dog whose genome was edited to develop the disease atherosclerosis.

Atherosclerosis, in which fatty material builds up and thickens artery walls, can cause heart attacks and strokes, and affects more than 15.8 million Americans alone.

Cardiovascular diseases are the number one cause of death globally, killing 17.7 million people in 2015, according to the WHO.

Longlong, the cloned pup with black, brown and white fur, has been sick with a blood-clotting disorder since birth. That is exactly what what scientists in China had wanted.

The pup was cloned from Apple, a different dog whose genome was edited to develop the disease.

With that genetic information now coded in, the disease — a leading cause of stroke and heart sickness — was passed along to Longlong, who scientists will use to study the condition and its possible cures. Sinogene, said Longlong is the world’s first dog cloned from a gene-edited donor. South Korean scientists cloned the first dog, an Afghan hound named Snuppy, in 2005. “A cloned dog born from a gene-edited cell donor is certainly a breakthrough,” says Eugene Redmond, director of Neural Transplantation and Repair at the Yale University School of Medicine, who was not involved in the research.

Sinogene successfully cloned two more puppies in this manner, meaning the company now has four genetically identical puppies — Apple, Longlong and two new canines, Xixi and Nuonuo. “Dogs share the most inheritable diseases with human beings, which makes them the best disease models to study,” said Feng Chong of Sinogene. — Agencies