中国企業、飼い猫のクローン化に初成功　次はパンダ？

【北京ＡＦＰ＝時事】中国の企業が、ペットの猫のクローン化に初めて成功した。7月21日に誕生したブリティッシュショートヘアのクローン子猫は、その7か月前に飼い猫をなくした顧客の依頼で作製されたという。（写真は中国で初めて誕生したクローン猫「大蒜」。クローンペット作製会社、北京希諾谷生物科技にて）
　クローンペット作製会社、北京希諾谷生物科技（希諾谷）は、これまで飼い犬４０匹以上のクローン作製に成功している。犬のクローン化の費用は３８万元（約５７０万円）と高額だが、猫のクローン化は２５万元（約３７０万円）でできるという。
　希諾谷の米継東最高経営責任者（ＣＥＯ）は、高額の費用がかかるからといって、全ての顧客が高所得者層なわけではないとＡＦＰに語った。「実際のところ、顧客の大多数は大学を卒業して間もない若者たちだ」
　「飼い主は、ペットの生まれに関係なく家族の一員とみなすだろう。ペットのクローン化は、若い世代の感情面のニーズを満たすものだ」と米氏。
　飼い猫「大蒜」と７か月前に死別した黄雨さん（２３）は、生まれ変わった愛猫の姿に感激。ニンニクを意味する同じ名前を付け、「２匹は９０％以上似ている」と話した。外見と同様に性格も似ていることを願っているという。
　中国の科学者らは、さらなるクローン化への挑戦に大きな野望を抱いており、猫のクローン化が可能ならば、パンダにも応用できるとして研究に取り組んでいる。
　多くの国でペットのクローン化は違法とされているが、韓国や米国など認められている国もある。米歌手バーブラ・ストライサンドさんは昨年、愛犬のクローンを作ったことを明らかにしている。【翻訳編集ＡＦＰＢＢＮｅｗｓ】
〔ＡＦＰ＝時事〕（2019/09/06-08:21）

Seven months after Huang Yu's pet cat Garlic died, the British shorthair was given a 10th life.
Born on July 21, the new Garlic was created by Chinese firm Sinogene, becoming the Beijing-based company's first successfully copied cat.
The pet-cloning outfit has made more than 40 pet dogs -- a procedure that costs a hefty 380,000 yuan ($53,000), while the price for a cat comes in at 250,000 yuan ($35,000).
Mi Jidong, the company's chief executive officer, told AFP that despite the high price tag, not all clients were high earners.
In fact, a large proportion of customers are young people who have only graduated in the last few years, he said.
Whatever the origin of pets, owners will see them as part of the family. Pet cloning meets the emotional needs of young generations.
Huang, 23, was overjoyed on first seeing Garlic's second incarnation, saying the similarity between the two cats is more than 90 percent.
When Garlic died, I was very sad, said Huang. I couldn't face the facts because it was a sudden death. I blame myself for not taking him to the hospital in time, which led to his death.
The happy owner says he hopes the personality of the new Garlic is as similar to his old white-and-grey cat as its appearance.
With a growing pet market in China, and a huge appetite among their owners for spending, Mi thinks the market for pet cloning is also set to rocket.
According to a report by Pet Fair Asia and pet website Goumin.com, pet-related spending in China reached 170.8 bn yuan ($23.7 billion) in 2018.
And the country's scientists have big aspirations for their next cloning challenge, working on the theory that if cats can be cloned, so can pandas.
Chen Dayuan -- an expert at the Chinese Academy of Sciences who has been researching giant panda cloning for 20 years -- said there could even be scope for cats to give birth to cloned baby pandas, which are smaller than baby cats despite their large size when fully grown.
Pet cloning is illegal in many countries but approved in countries including South Korea and the US, where singer Barbra Streisand announced last year she had cloned her dog.
The first major success in animal cloning was Dolly the sheep, born in Britain in 1996 as the first mammal cloned from an adult cell.
In 2005, researchers in South Korea cloned the first dog. The Sooam Biotech Research Foundation in Seoul says it has cloned some 800 pets and charges $100,000 each.