Cloning Within The Human Genome Project

The dictionary defines genome as the set of genes that specify all the characters that can be expressed in an organism. A genome is all the genetic material of a living being. It is the complete set of hereditary instructions for building and maintaining an organism and passing on life to the next generation. In most living things, the genome is made by a chemical called DNA. The genome contains genes, packed into chromosomes and affecting specific characteristics of the organism. In short, the genome is divided into chromosomes that contain genes, and genes are made of DNA.

Human Genome Project

This project was launched in 1990. The Human Genome Project attempts to determine which chromosome, and within these, where each gene is located. Each of these genes is composed of a long chain of nucleotides that constitute the lateral and vertical structure of a double helix called Watson's and Crick's on the other hand by horizontal steps made up of four bases, which are always joined together in the same way. Each triplet of nitrogenous bases as ordered encodes the formation of each of the 20 amino acids that make up the proteins. This same process occurs in all living beings, from unicellulars to humans.

The sequencing of the human genome opens up possibilities, but also confronts us with ethical questions:

• Prenatal diagnosis will be more accurate and reach a very wide range of diseases. This will sharpen the ethical discussion on abortion and the right to life of the unborn.
• It will be possible to modify the genetic basis of the somatic (general) cells responsible for certain diseases.
• It would be possible to modify the egg, the zygote or the embryo with few cells, like the principle of cloning. 

What is Cloning?

Cloning is the action of reproducing a being in a perfect way in the physiological and biochemical aspects of an original cell. Through cloning, the individual is obtained to have the same genes as the father or the mother, sexual reproduction is replaced by artificial reproduction, but the genes are provided by a single person, the individual will have the same genes, although it is possible that their traits may oscillate.

Knowing this, it is not possible to get an exact copy, with respect to the physical each person has groups of cells that are activated at a certain time that result in changes in their image, their personality, fortunately, would not be identical either, since it depends to some extent on the education and motivations they receive and the environment in which they grow up. In addition to this, just as if someone has a hereditary disease, through sexual reproduction he only has a percentage of possibilities that his descendants will inherit it, through cloning he has 100% of possibilities that they will suffer from it, since through genetic manipulation the defects cannot be corrected, but also thinking a little one can come to the conclusion that when the genes are treated by humans a mutation can be produced more easily.

Beginning of Cloning History

In February 1997, a group of geneticists led by Ian Wilmut of the Roslin Institute in Scotland announced that they had cloned a sheep named Dolly, which looked exactly like her mother. This sheep, which was born on July 5, 1996, became the first mammal to be cloned, and since then the word has been assimilated into our minds, but scientists had been studying cloning for more than twenty years. The first to succeed was the American biologists Robert Briggs and Thomas King who first cloned a frog in 1952.

One year after Dolly's birth, Advanced Cell Technology, a biotechnology company based in Massachusetts succeeded in cloning. On February 20, 1998, Marguerite, a cloned cow obtained from fetal muscle cells, was born in France. Also in Japan, at the Ishikawa Breeding Research Center, cloned calves were born between July and August 1998.

Conclusion 

Reaching the knowledge of the sequence of Human Genome Project would give us the possibility to obtain information for the future development of medicine and biology, making possible the invention of a new generation of medicines and the advent of strategic planning of prevention.