Cumulina (October 3, 1997 - May 5, 2000), a mouse, was the first animal cloned from adult cells that survived to adulthood. She was cloned using the Honolulu technique developed by "Team Yana", the Ryuzo Yanagimachi research group at the former campus of the John A. Burns School of Medicine located at the University of Hawai'i at Mānoa. Cumulina was a brown Mus musculus or common house mouse. She was named after the cumulus cells surrounding the developing oocyte in the ovarian follicle in mice. Nuclei from these cells were put into egg cell devoid of their original nuclei in the Honolulu cloning technique. All other mice produced by the Yanagimachi lab are just known by a number. [1]
Cumulina was able to produce two healthy litters. She was retired after the second.
Cumulina's preserved remains were displayed at the Institute for Biogenesis Research, a part of the John A. Burns School of Medicine laboratory, in Honolulu, Hawaii until 2022 when they were donated to the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of American History. [2]
Some of her descendants have been displayed at the Bishop Museum and the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago, Illinois. [3]
Cloning is the process of producing individual organisms with identical genomes, either by natural or artificial means. In nature, some organisms produce clones through asexual reproduction; this reproduction of an organism by itself without a mate is known as parthenogenesis. In the field of biotechnology, cloning is the process of creating cloned organisms of cells and of DNA fragments.
In genetics and developmental biology, somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT) is a laboratory strategy for creating a viable embryo from a body cell and an egg cell. The technique consists of taking a denucleated oocyte and implanting a donor nucleus from a somatic (body) cell. It is used in both therapeutic and reproductive cloning. In 1996, Dolly the sheep became famous for being the first successful case of the reproductive cloning of a mammal. In January 2018, a team of scientists in Shanghai announced the successful cloning of two female crab-eating macaques from foetal nuclei.
The University of Hawaiʻi System is a public college and university system in Hawaiʻi. The system confers associate, bachelor's, master's, and doctoral degrees through three universities, seven community colleges, an employment training center, three university centers, four education centers, and various other research facilities distributed across six islands throughout the state of Hawaii in the United States.
Embryonic stem cells (ESCs) are pluripotent stem cells derived from the inner cell mass of a blastocyst, an early-stage pre-implantation embryo. Human embryos reach the blastocyst stage 4–5 days post fertilization, at which time they consist of 50–150 cells. Isolating the inner cell mass (embryoblast) using immunosurgery results in destruction of the blastocyst, a process which raises ethical issues, including whether or not embryos at the pre-implantation stage have the same moral considerations as embryos in the post-implantation stage of development.
Sir Martin John EvansFLSW is an English biologist who, with Matthew Kaufman, was the first to culture mice embryonic stem cells and cultivate them in a laboratory in 1981. He is also known, along with Mario Capecchi and Oliver Smithies, for his work in the development of the knockout mouse and the related technology of gene targeting, a method of using embryonic stem cells to create specific gene modifications in mice. In 2007, the three shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in recognition of their discovery and contribution to the efforts to develop new treatments for illnesses in humans.
Ryuzo Yanagimachi was a Japanese-born, American-based scientist. He made numerous key contributions to the study of mammalian fertilization, and he was also a pioneer in the cloning field. Accordingly, he assisted in fertilization technologies such as in vitro fertilization and direct sperm injection into the egg, which are widely used today in human infertility clinics throughout the world. In 1997, his laboratory at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa successfully cloned mice using the Honolulu technique.
The Jackson Laboratory is an independent, non-profit biomedical research institution which was founded by Clarence Cook Little in 1929. It employs over 3,000 employees in Bar Harbor, Maine; Sacramento, California; Farmington, Connecticut; Shanghai, China; and Yokohama, Japan. The institution is a National Cancer Institute-designated Cancer Center and has NIH Centers of Excellence in aging and systems genetics. The stated mission of The Jackson Laboratory is "to discover the genetic basis for preventing, treating and curing human diseases, and to enable research and education for the global biomedical community."
Andrzej Krzysztof Tarkowski was a Polish embryologist and a professor at Warsaw University. He is best known for his pioneering researches on embryos and blastomeres, which have created theoretical and practical basis for achievements of biology and medicine of the twentieth century – in vitro fertilization, cloning and stem cell discovery. In 2002 Tarkowski with Anne McLaren won the Japan Prize for their discoveries concerning the early development of mammalian embryos.
Rudolf Jaenisch is a Professor of Biology at MIT and a founding member of the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research. He is a pioneer of transgenic science, in which an animal’s genetic makeup is altered. Jaenisch has focused on creating genetically modified mice to study cancer, epigenetic reprogramming and neurological diseases.
Humanized antibodies are antibodies from non-human species whose protein sequences have been modified to increase their similarity to antibody variants produced naturally in humans. The process of "humanization" is usually applied to monoclonal antibodies developed for administration to humans. Humanization can be necessary when the process of developing a specific antibody involves generation in a non-human immune system. The protein sequences of antibodies produced in this way are partially distinct from homologous antibodies occurring naturally in humans, and are therefore potentially immunogenic when administered to human patients. The International Nonproprietary Names of humanized antibodies end in -zumab, as in omalizumab.
Toshiko Takaezu was an American ceramic artist, painter, sculptor, and educator whose oeuvre spanned a wide range of mediums, including ceramics, weavings, bronzes, and paintings. She is noted for her pioneering work in ceramics and has played an important role in the international revival of interest in the ceramic arts. Takaezu was known for her rounded, closed ceramic forms which broke from traditions of clay as a medium for functional objects. Instead she explored clay's potential for aesthetic expression, taking on Abstract Expressionist concepts in a manner that places her work in the realm of postwar abstractionism. She is of Japanese descent and from Pepeeko, Hawaii.
John Edgar Dick is Canada Research Chair in Stem Cell Biology, Senior Scientist at the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, University Health Network and Professor in the Department of Molecular Genetics at the University of Toronto in Canada. Dick is credited with first identifying cancer stem cells in certain types of human leukemia. His revolutionary findings highlighted the importance of understanding that not all cancer cells are the same and thus spawned a new direction in cancer research. Dick is also known for his demonstration of a blood stem cell's ability to replenish the blood system of a mouse, his development of a technique to enable an immune-deficient mouse to carry and produce human blood, and his creation of the world's first mouse with human leukemia.
Kevin Eggan is a Professor of Stem Cell and Regenerative Biology at Harvard University, known for his work in stem cell research, and as a spokesperson for stem cell research in the United States. He was a 2006 recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship. In 2005, he was named to the MIT Technology Review TR35 as one of the top 35 innovators in the world under the age of 35.
Ralph Lawrence Brinster is an American geneticist, National Medal of Science laureate, and Richard King Mellon Professor of Reproductive Physiology at the School of Veterinary Medicine, University of Pennsylvania.
Homeobox protein EMX1 is a protein that in humans is encoded by the EMX1 gene. The transcribed EMX1 gene is a member of the EMX family of transcription factors. The EMX1 gene, along with its family members, are expressed in the developing cerebrum. EMX1 plays a role in specification of positional identity, the proliferation of neural stem cells, differentiation of layer-specific neuronal phenotypes and commitment to a neuronal or glial cell fate.
In molecular cloning and biology, a gene knock-in refers to a genetic engineering method that involves the one-for-one substitution of DNA sequence information in a genetic locus or the insertion of sequence information not found within the locus. Typically, this is done in mice since the technology for this process is more refined and there is a high degree of shared sequence complexity between mice and humans. The difference between knock-in technology and traditional transgenic techniques is that a knock-in involves a gene inserted into a specific locus, and is thus a "targeted" insertion. It is the opposite of gene knockout.
Genetically modified mammals are mammals that have been genetically engineered. They are an important category of genetically modified organisms. The majority of research involving genetically modified mammals involves mice with attempts to produce knockout animals in other mammalian species limited by the inability to derive and stably culture embryonic stem cells.
Beatrice Mintz was an American embryologist who contributed to the understanding of genetic modification, cellular differentiation, and cancer, particularly melanoma. Mintz was a pioneer of genetic engineering techniques and was among the first scientists to generate both chimeric and transgenic mammals.
A knockout mouse, or knock-out mouse, is a genetically modified mouse in which researchers have inactivated, or "knocked out", an existing gene by replacing it or disrupting it with an artificial piece of DNA. They are important animal models for studying the role of genes which have been sequenced but whose functions have not been determined. By causing a specific gene to be inactive in the mouse, and observing any differences from normal behaviour or physiology, researchers can infer its probable function.