Transgenic dogs

ruppy

1. TRANSGENIC DOGS BY SHRUSHTI JOSHI 1850302

2. INTRODUCTION A transgenic animal is an animal "in which there has been a deliberate modification of its genome, the genetic makeup of an organism responsible for inherited characteristics," according to the Federation of European Laboratory Animal Associations. A cloned beagle named Ruppy – short for Ruby Puppy – is the world’s first transgenic dog. She and four other beagles all produce a fluorescent protein that glows red under ultraviolet light.

3. BACKGROUND A team led by Byeong -Chun Lee of Seoul National University in South Korea created the dogs by cloning fibroblast cells that express a red fluorescent gene produced by sea anemones.[drfp583] Lee and stem cell researcher Woo Suk Hwang were part of a team that created the first cloned dog, Snuppy, in 2005. Scientists hope to knock out a specific oestrogen receptor in dogs to understand the hormone effects on fertility Fig- Ruppy the transgenic puppy at 10 days old under ultraviolet light, showing the red fluorescent protein produced by sea anemones

4. MAKING A GLOWING DOG The world's first transgenic dogs were produced by somatic cell nuclear transfer Lee’s team created Ruppy by first infecting dog fibroblast cells with a virus that inserted the fluorescent gene into a cell’s nucleus. They then transferred the fibroblast’s nucleus to another dog’s egg cell, with its nucleus removed. After a few hours dividing in a Petri dish, researchers implanted the cloned embryo into a surrogate mother.

5. WHY DOGS…… The domestic dog, Canis familiaris , reportedly bears over 450 diseases; approximately 360 of which are analogous to human diseases Humans and dogs are 85 percent identical genetically. As a spontaneous model for many heritable human diseases, the dog provides an excellent system for the identification and study of disease loci , particularly cancer loci. Specific advantages of the dog system include -a limited number of founders, popular sires, limited locus and disease heterogeneity .

6. EXAMPLES Inherited neurological diseases has been identified by means of the dog genome to be caused by a dodecamer repeat in the Epm2b ( Nhlrc 1) gene that is said to be responsible for idiopathic epileptic cases. Carcinogenic pathways have been identified by scientist by using the dog genome technique to isolate and identify RCND mutation responsible for Renal Cystadenocarcinoma and Dermatofibrosis especially associated with German Shepherd dogs. Mapping studies are underway to map cancers, kidney diseases, endocrine disorders, behavioral disorders, eye diseases and reproductive disorders

7. DRAWBACKS Use of a retrovirus to transfer the fluorescent gene indicating they could not control where the virus inserted the gene. In the future, creating a "knockout" dog, the way researchers do with mice and rats, would be a challenge, as would "engineering dogs that produce mutant forms of a gene." low efficiency of cloning

8. references Generation of red fluorescent protein transgenic dogs by Dae Yong Kim CheMyong Ko and Byeong Chun Lee The Dog as a Model Organism for Research. - Hans Ellegren Leading the way: canine models of genomics and disease by Abigail L. Shearin and Elaine A. Ostrander

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