世界首例體細胞克隆猴在中國誕生

China became the first country to clone a monkey using non-reproductive cells, reducing the need to breed lab monkeys and paving the way for more accurate, effective, and affordable animal tests for new drugs, scientists said on Thursday.

科學(xué)家們周四稱，中國成為首個使用非生殖細胞克隆猴的國家，這將減少培育實驗用猴的需要，為更精確有效、經(jīng)濟可行的動物新藥測試打下基礎(chǔ)。

By December, the Institute of Neuroscience of the Chinese Academy of Sciences had created two clone macaques named "Zhong Zhong" and "Hua Hua" by nuclear transferring of somatic cells -- any cell in the organism other than reproductive cells. This was the similar technology used to create the famous clone sheep Dolly in 1996.

截至去年12月，中國科學(xué)院神經(jīng)科學(xué)研究所通過體細胞(生物體中的非生殖細胞)的細胞核移植，成功培育出兩只克隆獼猴，起名“中中”和“華華”。這與1996年培育出克隆綿羊“多利”的技術(shù)十分相似。

Tetra, a rhesus monkey born in 1999, is the world`s first ever-cloned monkey, but it was done using a simpler method called embryo splitting, but it could only generate four cloned offspring at a time and cannot be genetically modified to suit experimental needs, said Pu Muming, an academician at the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the director of Institute of Neuroscience, CAS.

誕生于1999年的恒河猴Tetra是世界上首只克隆猴，當時使用的是胚胎分裂技術(shù)這種更簡單的方法，但一次只能克隆出四個克隆體，且無法進行基因編輯以滿足實驗需求，中科院神經(jīng)科學(xué)研究所所長蒲慕明院士表示。

"Cloning a monkey using somatic cells has been a world-class challenge because it is a primate that shares its genetic makeup, therefore all of its complexity, with humans," he said.

“使用體細胞克隆猴子是一個世界性難題，因為猴子作為靈長類，和人類有著同樣復(fù)雜的基因組成，”他說道。

"For drug and other lab tests, scientists have to purchase monkeys from all over the world, which is costly, bad for the environment and produces inaccurate results because each monkey might have different genes," Pu said.

“對于藥物和其他實驗室實驗而言，科學(xué)家們需要從全球各地購買猴子，不光成本高昂，不利于環(huán)境，而且實驗結(jié)果也并不準確，因為每只猴子可能都帶有不同的基因，”蒲慕明表示。

"By cloning monkey using somatic cells, we can mass cultivate large number of genetically identical offspring in a short amount of time, and we can even change their genes to suit our needs," he added. "This can save time, cut down experiment costs, and produce more accurate results, leading to more effective medicine."

“通過體細胞克隆猴子，我們可以在短時間內(nèi)培育大量基因相同的猴子，甚至根據(jù)需求編輯基因，”他補充道。“這可以節(jié)省時間，減少實驗開支，提供更準確的實驗結(jié)果，從而帶來更有效的新藥。”

Sun Qiang, director of the non-human primate research facility at the institute, said most of the drug trials are currently done on lab mice. However, drugs that work on mice might not work or even have severe side effects on humans because the two species are so different.

中科院神經(jīng)科學(xué)研究所非人靈長類研究平臺主任孫強表示，目前大多數(shù)藥物試驗是采用實驗室小鼠完成的。但由于小鼠和人類相差太遠，在小鼠身上有效的藥物或許對人類不起作用，甚至還具有嚴重的副作用。

"Monkeys and Humans are both primates, so they are much closely related and testing on Monkeys is supposed to be as effective as testing on humans," he said. This is especially useful in testing drugs for neural diseases such as Parkinson`s disease, metabolic and immune system disease, and tumor, he added.

“猴子和人類同屬靈長類，因此兩者之間非常相近，而在猴子身上進行試驗被認為和人體試驗一樣有效，”他表示。這對于測試帕金森氏病、代謝與免疫系統(tǒng)疾病以及腫瘤等神經(jīng)疾病的藥物尤其有用，他補充道。

"This achievement will help China lead the world research in an international science projects related to neural mapping of primate brains," he said. However, bio labs from the United States, Japan, and European countries are also very capable, and they will quickly catch up to China after the monkey cloning technology is made public, Sun added.

“這項成就將令我國在‘靈長類全腦圖譜計劃’國際科學(xué)項目中處于領(lǐng)跑地位，”他表示。然而，美國、日本以及歐洲國家的生物實驗室也很有能力，在克隆猴技術(shù)公諸于眾后很快就會趕超上來，孫強補充道。

"This means we have to innovate continuously and work extra harder this year to stay ahead," he said.

“這意味著我們今年需要不斷創(chuàng)新，更加努力，才能保持領(lǐng)先地位，”他表示。