Advanced Cell Technologies (ACT), the company that announced the first human embryo clone and the first cloned gaur in 2001, last week helped to bring two bouncing bantengs into the world, only to euthanize one of them this week because it was grossly malformed.
While the first, still healthy, calf weighed a normal 20 kg at birth, the second was abnormally large at 36 kg. In vitro tinkering with cattle and sheep embryos can lead to such "large calf syndrome," which is commonly attributed to placental abnormalities, said Robert Lanza, vice president of Medical and Scientific Development for the biotech based in Worcester, Mass.
The normal calf suckled 5 liters of colostrum its first day, the second was reluctant, taking in only about 500 ml. "He had improved over the weekend, but nosedived," Lanza explained. The abnormal calf was euthanized on April 8. "With cows, almost all animals that make...
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