What is therapeutic cloning?
Therapeutic cloning is the same as cloning, except that it is designed only for the purpose of clinical treatment. For example, if a patient has liver damage, it is theoretically possible to manipulate the environment in which a cloned cell is growing so that it becomes a liver cell. If the cells are allowed to replicate, they can then regenerate the liver.
It’s a laboratory technique that uses somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT) to make embryonic stem cell lines. In SCNT, the nucleus of an unfertilized donor egg is extracted and replaced with the nucleus from an adult cell, such as a skin cell. Given the proper signals, the egg can be tricked into repeatedly dividing. The resulting nuclear transfer product is allowed to develop for several days. Then some of the cells are removed and placed in a laboratory culture dish, where they grow into an embryonic stem cell line that can be used for research. So far, this procedure has been accomplished in animals but not in humans.
