Sette cuccioli di beagle e cocker spaniel sono i primi cani fatti nascere in provetta. Pubblicato sulla rivista Plos One, l'esperimento è stato condotto negli Stati Uniti, presso l'Istituto Baker per la salute animale della Cornell University.
Nati da 19 embrioni impiantati, i cuccioli sono il risultato di una nuova tecnica che combina la tradizionale fecondazione artificiale con la riscrittura del DNA. Per il direttore del laboratorio, Alex Travis, dopo decenni di tentativi adesso è possibile "congelare gli spermatozoi e conservarli in banche per utilizzarli nella fecondazione artificiale". Grazie a questa tecnica, ha aggiunto, "siamo in grado di conservare il patrimonio genetico di specie minacciate".
La prospettiva futura è ancora più ambiziosa e consiste nell'utilizzare la tecnica considerata la "forbice" naturale del DNA, la Crispr (Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats) per rimuovere le sequenze di informazione genetica già nell'embrione. Nello stesso modo diventa anche possibile studiare le numerose malattie genetiche comuni a uomini e cani.
L'uomo, condivide con il cane ben 350 malattie ereditarie: circa il doppio rispetto a quelle che ha in comune con altre specie.
ANSA/M.Ang.
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