Toppy is the name given to seven
cloned
Cloning is the process of producing individual organisms with identical or virtually identical DNA, either by natural or artificial means. In nature, some organisms produce clones through asexual reproduction. In the field of biotechnology, c ...
dogs, born in late 2007 to three
surrogate mothers.
[ ] They were the world's first cloned
working dogs, and were used by the
Korea Customs Service
The Korea Customs Service (, KCS) is one of tax organizations in South Korea and is run under the Ministry of Economy and Finance. The headquarters is in Seo District, Daejeon
Daejeon () is South Korea's fifth-largest metropolis, with a popu ...
.
Each Toppy is a clone of a successful
sniffer dog
A detection dog or sniffer dog is a dog that is trained to use its senses to detect substances such as explosives, illegal drugs, wildlife scat, currency, blood, and contraband electronics such as illicit mobile phones. The sense most used by d ...
in
Canada.
[ ] The Toppy dogs needed 16 months of training to qualify to work for the South Korean Customs Service.
Only 10-15% of dogs are genetically predisposed to being effective detection dogs.
[ ]
The project cost
₩300 million (about US$240,000), and was funded by the
Government of South Korea;
it was led by
Lee Byeong-chun, a former aide to
Hwang Woo-suk
Hwang Woo-suk ( ko, 황우석, born January 29, 1953)Sources disagree on the birthdate due to confusion between different calendar systems. Hwang was born on January 29, 1953 in the Gregorian calendar. However, older Koreans often list their bir ...
, who fell from grace after his
stem cell
In multicellular organisms, stem cells are undifferentiated or partially differentiated cells that can differentiate into various types of cells and proliferate indefinitely to produce more of the same stem cell. They are the earliest type o ...
research turned out to be fabricated.
See also
*
Snuppy
Snuppy (Korean: 스너피 a portmanteau of " SNU" and "puppy"; April 24, 2005–May 2015) was an Afghan hound, the first dog clone. The puppy was created using a cell from an ear from an adult Afghan hound and involved 123 surrogate mothers, of ...
*
Hwang Woo-suk
Hwang Woo-suk ( ko, 황우석, born January 29, 1953)Sources disagree on the birthdate due to confusion between different calendar systems. Hwang was born on January 29, 1953 in the Gregorian calendar. However, older Koreans often list their bir ...
References
{{korea-stub
2007 animal births
Cloned dogs
Dog breeding
Science and technology in South Korea