http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20010628/hl/cats_1.html
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Thursday
June 28 1:21 PM ET
By Steve James
NEW YORK (Reuters) - This is not to be sneezed at.
The man who created the first cloned mammal in the United States--Amy the calf--is
working on a new project: a genetically altered cat that will not make allergic
pet lovers miserable.
University of Connecticut professor Xiangzhong (Jerry) Yang said Wednesday
that such an allergen-free feline could be available by the year 2003. But he
claimed this was not the start of a new world of engineered pets.
The no-sneeze cat was just an offshoot of his research into human ailments
like Parkinson's disease (news
- web
sites) or diabetes, he said.
``We're just working with animal models,'' said Yang, who noted that he is
opposed to human cloning.
However, Yang, who heads UConn's Transgenic Animal Research facility, is
working with Transgenic Pets, LLC, a start-up biotechnology company that plans
to sell non-allergenic cats for $750 to $1,000 each. Company founder Dr. David
Avner is still looking to raise an estimated $2 million to pay for Yang's
research.
``For millions of Americans, owning a pet can cause serious health
problems,'' said Avner, an emergency room resident at a Syracuse, New York,
hospital. ``It is estimated that up to 15% of the US population is allergic to
pets, with cat allergies being twice as common as dog allergies.''
Avner said the company he founded with his wife Jackie will use a
proprietary process to counteract the genes in cats responsible for causing
human allergies like asthma, sneezing, runny nose and itchy eyes.
He said an allergen protein is secreted by glands in the cat's skin, and
coming into contact with the allergen causes a reaction in some people. Yang is
working on knocking out the gene that produces the protein by taking cat cells
and replacing them with genes that do not cause a problem in humans.
The genetically altered cells will then be fused with egg cells from which
the genetic material has been removed, and the eggs will be implanted in a
surrogate mother.
Once some male and female allergen-free cats have been made this way, more
can be produced by conventional breeding. The technique is similar to the way
Yang cloned a calf at UConn in 1999, some 18 months after scientists in
Scotland carried out the world's first cloning of a mammal that produced Dolly
the sheep.
Yang denied that producing such cats would lead to dogs that do not chew up
slippers or parakeets that will not squawk too loudly. ``Dogs? I won't even
touch dogs,'' he told Reuters. ''They are a lot more difficult than cats. We
know even less about their reproductive systems.''
He said the only reason he got involved with cats was that he and his family
are all highly allergic and his son suffered miserably one day after being with
a cat-owning babysitter.
Jackie Avner told Reuters that her husband had a patent pending that applied
only to pet-borne human allergens.
``We are just interested in the human medical condition of allergies,'' she
said, adding that she and her husband are looking forward to the time when they
could own a cat.
The news was not welcomed by the animal rights group People for the Ethical
Treatment of Animals (PETA), which said allergic owners already had the option
of adopting one of the estimated 20 million abandoned cats and dogs in US
animal shelters.
``It's all a money game. I have no interest in what he says (about medical
research),'' said PETA president Ingrid Newkirk. ''There is lots wrong with
transgenic this and that. Many transgenic animals have been found to have
deformities which were not anticipated or understood.
``We don't know what we're doing, but it won't stop people trying to make money,''
said Newkirk.
The idea of genetically modifying animals to produce traits desirable to
humans is not new. One company is trying to genetically engineer pigs whose
organs can be transplanted into humans without being rejected.
``It's not a big step from there to say, 'let's go to cats and modify some
of their characteristics','' said Ronald Pepin, vice president of business
development at Medarex, a Princeton, New Jersey-based company that has
genetically engineered mice to produce human antibodies. ``You might be able to
make them resistant to fleas, for instance.''
Bert Innes, a biotechnology analyst at Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada,
said people want the perfect pet.
``Having them not shed is a good thing, and there are behavioral things that
could be done, as well as size and longevity,'' he said at a biotechnology
conference in San Diego.
``With just about anything you can think of that is wrong with a pet,'' he
said, ``you should be able to come up with a genetic solution to fix them.''
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