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Frozen Mice Cloned

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the science-fiction-will-be-real-in-our-lifetime dept.

m0rphin3 writes "Japanese scientists have cloned mice whose bodies were frozen for as long as 16 years and said on Monday it may be possible to use the technique to resurrect mammoths and other extinct species. Could we finally see Jurassic Park become a reality, or perhaps use this for colonizing other galaxies?"

54 of 272 comments (clear)

  1. That juicy t-bone steak by VincenzoRomano · · Score: 2, Funny

    I had in the last BBQ would also need cloning!

    --
    Maybe Computers will never be as intelligent as Humans.
    For sure they won't ever become so stupid. [VR-1988]
    1. Re:That juicy t-bone steak by Ethanol-fueled · · Score: 5, Interesting

      That's why this type of research needs to continue to push forward.

      We could be eating fresh prime rib almost every day without worrying about ethical issues concerning the raising of animals in inhumane conditions, and we'd be cutting down on the methane as well as not having to pump our meat full of hormones and antibiotics. It's much easier to grow a mass of muscle cells and raise them to maturity than it would be to grow an entire animal from scratch. I'll gladly be a guinea pig as I don't care of the meat looks like a softball so long as it tastes good.

    2. Re:That juicy t-bone steak by CRCulver · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I've already seen much comment by fanatical vegans on the Internet that even meat from lab-grown cells is deplorable. Their reasoning is that even if no animal was actually killed, people have still not subdued that part of themselves that gets pleasure from eating animal flesh.

    3. Re:That juicy t-bone steak by Changa_MC · · Score: 5, Funny

      I've already seen much comment by fanatical vegans on the Internet that even meat from lab-grown cells is deplorable.

      But those are vegans. Us vegetarian-types would buy up lab-meat by the ton.

      --
      Changa hates change.
    4. Re:That juicy t-bone steak by Ethanol-fueled · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Many vegans have the righteous "anti-establishment" mentality while refusing to understand that humans are omnivores and have been engineered to eat meats and plants. We need plants for minerals and meats for amino acids.

    5. Re:That juicy t-bone steak by billcopc · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I think it'd be easier to kill all the hippies.

      --
      -Billco, Fnarg.com
    6. Re:That juicy t-bone steak by sexconker · · Score: 4, Funny

      Cruelty adds flavor.

    7. Re:That juicy t-bone steak by Greyfox · · Score: 2, Funny
      I'll gladly be a guinea pig as I don't care of the meat looks like a softball so long as it tastes good.

      I'm sure we'll find you to be both tasty and delicious.

      --

      I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?

    8. Re:That juicy t-bone steak by antifoidulus · · Score: 2, Funny

      Yeah, but years of self-abuse have made their meat very tough, so why bother?

      --
      Monstar L
    9. Re:That juicy t-bone steak by Sloppy · · Score: 2, Insightful

      So it's like CGI porn for pedophiles? The atrocity is in yourself, not the act.

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      As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
    10. Re:That juicy t-bone steak by ShadowBlasko · · Score: 2, Insightful

      fanatical vegans... say that even if no animal was actually killed, people have still not subdued that part of themselves that gets pleasure from eating animal flesh.

      Mmmm. Animal flesh. (drool). I wonder what Vegan tastes like?

      Bitter. Very bitter.

      Which is why I don't date them anymore. Just cant deal with the taste of vegan women.

      --
      There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order- Ed Howdershelt Via Tass
    11. Re:That juicy t-bone steak by Sloppy · · Score: 2, Informative

      Sorry, not my position, was just trying to clarify theirs.

      --
      As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
    12. Re:That juicy t-bone steak by Theolojin · · Score: 4, Funny

      Mmmm. Animal flesh. (drool). I wonder what Vegan tastes like?

      Rather like cat. Not as gamey as dog, and lighter in texture than squirrel. Similar to kobe beef, but not quite as much marbling, due to the lack of fat in their diet. Oh, and utterly *unlike* rabbit.

      --
      Life is short; think quickly.
  2. The biggest question by Overzeetop · · Score: 4, Funny

    Who keeps dead mice in their freezer for 16 years? Remind me not to have the Brunswick stew at their house.

    --
    Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
    1. Re:The biggest question by halcyon1234 · · Score: 4, Funny

      Who keeps dead mice in their freezer for 16 years?

      What, you don't like micicles?

      --
      UTF-8: There and Back Again
  3. Or colonizing galaxies with mamoths? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    We use this technology to colonize other galaxies with giant wooly mamoths. That would be so cool.

    1. Re:Or colonizing galaxies with mamoths? by dogdick · · Score: 5, Funny

      I concur, lets confuse the shit out of other intelligent life when they start visiting our solar system.

    2. Re:Or colonizing galaxies with mamoths? by WK2 · · Score: 4, Funny

      That explains how million year old fossils ended up on a 6 thousand year old planet.

      --
      Write your own Choose Your Own Adventure. http://www.freegameengines.org/gamebook-engine/
    3. Re:Or colonizing galaxies with mamoths? by city · · Score: 2, Funny

      No, no, no, we need to use this technology responsibly. How about we reintroduce extinct species to their natural habitats. Let's start with sabre-tooth tigers in the greater Los Angeles metropolitan area.

      --
      I am a v1ral sig. Plse c0py me and h3lp me spread. Thank y0u?
  4. Hmmmm by Andr+T. · · Score: 2, Funny

    Now that mice ice-cream factory I was planning will work _very_ well.

    --

    Any life is made up of a single moment, the moment in which a man finds out, once and for all, who he is.

  5. Not that interesting by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    Drop some DNA or a mouse in liquid nitrogen or even a -80 freezer and it will last indefinitely. Cloning is interesting but length of storage isn't.

    1. Re:Not that interesting by mr_mischief · · Score: 3, Informative

      The point is that they didn't do anything special to protect the cells against the damage of freezing. They took a mouse that was frozen just the way an animal would be frozen after death in the wild and worked around the damage freezing causes. The current cloning processes all use an intact healthy cell from an adult. This proves that's not necessary.

  6. 16 years is not by BigGar' · · Score: 4, Insightful

    16,000 or 160,000,000 years. While this may be "just engineering" to some, it's still a big just as there's still a lot of DNA degradation that happens over the course of millennia. There's a lot of reasons this might not work for a species we've never seen develop.

    Of course it may work smackingly well and we'll all have miniature pet t-rex's in my lifetime. That would be sweet, the cat may not like it though.

    --


    Shop smart, Shop S-Mart.
    1. Re:16 years is not by jollyreaper · · Score: 5, Funny

      16,000 or 160,000,000 years. While this may be "just engineering" to some, it's still a big just as there's still a lot of DNA degradation that happens over the course of millennia. There's a lot of reasons this might not work for a species we've never seen develop.

      That's why you plug the gaps with frog DNA. Nothing could possibly go wrong!

      --
      Kwisatz Haderach
      Sell the spice to CHOAM
      This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
  7. Galaxies? by 1u3hr · · Score: 5, Insightful
    or perhaps use this for colonizing other galaxies

    Getting ahead of ourselves, arent we?

    Why don't we check out the 400 billion stars in our own galaxy first?

    Or is it you don't know what a galaxy is?

    (Sorry, is that too many rhetorical questions?)

    1. Re:Galaxies? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

      (Sorry, is that too many rhetorical questions?)

      I don't know, was that a rhetorical question?

    2. Re:Galaxies? by Rorschach1 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      You beat me to it. This is one of my pet peeves, and it shows up a lot in the crap that tries to pass itself off as science fiction on TV and in the movies. Does the general public really have no idea what a galaxy IS, or how far away other galaxies are, or how MANY stars there are in our own galaxy?

      Same thing with time scales. Seems like no one cares too much to keep their millions, billions, and trillions straight. Come on, folks, it'll only take you 30 seconds of research to avoid making your ancient galactic empire a thousand times older than the universe itself.

      Maybe writers think that because they don't understand it, no one else does and it doesn't really matter. Maybe I'll start writing sports stories, and attribute everything I don't understand to the infield fly rule, since I don't really understand it. No matter if the story is about football.

    3. Re:Galaxies? by lennier · · Score: 3, Funny

      "Maybe I'll start writing sports stories, and attribute everything I don't understand to the infield fly rule, since I don't really understand it. No matter if the story is about football."

      And it's fifteen-love-all, Godspeed You! Black Emperor coming up the inside straight, tacking to windward and about to haul the spinnaker, but oh no what's this, the referee's calling a line-out, leg before wicket, straight to the solar plexus and his king's in check. Respawn, quad damage, but can he get a triple-word score on the centre square. Yes he can, he's cleared the sand trap, an eagle under par at silly mid off and what a finish, what a finish. Straight to Alpha Centauri. Magnificent.

      --
      You are not a brain: http://books.google.com/books?id=2oV61CeDx-YC
  8. Not dinosaurs by rrohbeck · · Score: 3, Insightful

    because there's hardly any DNA left in those fossils, let alone anything that's not damaged beyond recognition.
    Mammoths, saber toothed cats or other species that have gone extinct more recently on the other hand...

    --
    thegodmovie.com - watch it
    1. Re:Not dinosaurs by Thiez · · Score: 4, Funny

      How about the dodo.

      Admit it you want to know how it tastes!

    2. Re:Not dinosaurs by RabidMoose · · Score: 4, Funny

      During the sentencing of John Doe for the killing and eating of albino baby seals, the judge calls John up to the stand, and quietly asks him: "Out of sheer curiosity, what did they taste like?"
      To which John replies: "Sort of like a cross between bald eagle eggs and emperor penguin."

    3. Re:Not dinosaurs by drfishy · · Score: 5, Funny

      A funny post to be sure, but from accounts ~400 years ago we already know it tastes rather fowl.

  9. Ice Age Sequel by dafz1 · · Score: 5, Funny

    Ice Age 3: Attack of the Clones

  10. Jurrasic Park by clarkkent09 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Mammoths? Correct me if I'm wrong, but you still need a live animal in order to clone a dead one. I guess they can grow them in an elephant or another close cousin, is that the idea?

    --
    Negative moral value of force outweighs the positive value of good intentions.
  11. Re:ethics by clarkkent09 · · Score: 5, Funny

    I mean, I'm all for freezing polar bears and other endangered species so that we can revive them when the weather is better (kind of like that grain vault) but shouldn't it be regulated so that it isn't creating awkward scenarios?

    Like what, a long extinct animal suddenly appearing at a dinner party, causing everybody to spit out their drinks?

    --
    Negative moral value of force outweighs the positive value of good intentions.
  12. Alright, let's decide right now. by Yvan256 · · Score: 2, Funny

    We know someone is going to make a real-life Jurassic Park someday, let's decide right now where it should be.

    We need a really isolated island, let the voting begin!

    Reply with your choice and for which reasons.

    1. Re:Alright, let's decide right now. by rrohbeck · · Score: 2, Funny

      Japan.
      They have lots of experience with Godzilla already.

      --
      thegodmovie.com - watch it
  13. Brilliant! by ChinggisK · · Score: 3, Funny

    Could we finally see Jurassic Park become a reality

    Yea we should totally do that, because it worked out so well in the movie.

    1. Re:Brilliant! by exp(pi*sqrt(163)) · · Score: 4, Informative

      Breaking news! Michael Crichton, the author of the blockbuster science-fiction novel "Jurassic Park," and winner of an Academy Technical Achievement Award has died. He was 66. Truly an American icon.

      --
      Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
    2. Re:Brilliant! by AttillaTheNun · · Score: 5, Funny

      Quick, while his DNA is still warm!

  14. Any bets by rehtonAesoohC · · Score: 2

    on how long it will take PETA to get involved and start making features like The Meatrix?

  15. Colonization by nani+popoki · · Score: 2, Funny

    Yes. Pretty soon the galaxy will be full of spaceships carrying frozen telephone sanitizors.

  16. michael crichton just died by Digitus1337 · · Score: 4, Informative

    It's interesting that you mention this; http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/11/05/print/main4575403.shtml .

  17. Michael Crichton died today by kentrel · · Score: 4, Informative

    RIP http://news.google.co.uk/news/url?sa=t&ct=uk/0-0&fp=491182f120c62f7f&ei=XuERScjTB4LAwgGmqZTzBA&url=http%3A//www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/11/05/print/main4575403.shtml&cid=0&usg=AFQjCNHcr8G0ar1Zy3zr0YIYCdj0c4I2iw

  18. Crichton died today, pre-Jurassic Park technology by The+Fun+Guy · · Score: 2, Informative

    If only Michael Crichton could have lived to see it all come true.

    Bring on the velociraptors!

    --
    The man who does not read good books has no advantage over the man who cannot read them. - Mark Twain
  19. What are we going to do.... by nadamucho · · Score: 3, Funny

    ....with TWO frozen mice?

  20. Not quite. by Brain-Fu · · Score: 2, Insightful

    We need plants for minerals and meats for amino acids.

    We get all the amino acids we need from plants. We don't actually 'need' meat at all. This belief is largely the product of successful marketing on the part of the meat and dairy industry.

    That doesn't mean we can't or shouldn't eat meat though. We do plenty of things we don't need to do, and it is ok.

    1. Re:Not quite. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I think it would be more accurate to say we don't need to eat meat anymore. Fact of the matter is, meat is a much more energy dense than plant matter. That's why herbivores seem to be eating all the time and carnivores are always laying around.

    2. Re:Not quite. by hey! · · Score: 2, Informative

      Well, you have to make a distinction between what an individual "needs" to survive and what a species "needs" to support certain evolutionary trends.

      There is seems to be considerable scientific opinion to the effect that meat eating played an important role in making the large brained, linguistically gifted and tool making species H. sapiens possible. However, this doesn't mean that individual humans or pre-humans have ever "needed" meat to survive, or that eating meat to any degree was more "healthy" as we'd define it.

      Humans in primitive conditions no doubt ate opportunistically. If you're a primitive person out hunting, you aren't going to ignore a bush full of berries because today's hunting day. Edible herbs probably went straight into the mouth without a second thought. So I expect people were constantly grazing on plants. On the other hand, they'd also gorge themselves on meat when given a chance -- check out the huge prehistoric shell middens they left behind. And of course, when you kill a mammoth, you'd better have a refrigerator for all that meat.

      And, of course, humans didn't have refrigerators; they just became extremely adept at turning those meat calories into fat. They had to store calories, to support their very thermally expensive brains.

      A modern person, of course, can graze on herbs and roots all the time. It's probably healthier for him too, although regular, small inclusions of meat in his diet do no harm and simplify getting the amino acids he needs.

      --
      Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
  21. I told the waiter by Dareth · · Score: 2, Interesting

    ... that steak was so good I wouldn't mind meeting the cow, um er well too late I guess.

    About 5-10 years from now
    Me: Give me a '08 Fb795 ribeye please medium rare...
    Waiter: An excellent choice, good vintage there.

    --

    I only look human.
    My mother is a halfling and my dad is an ogre, so that makes me an Ogreling
  22. Better rethink that plan by monkeySauce · · Score: 2, Funny

    I don't think colonizing other galaxies with frozen mice is such a great idea. Live mice aren't too bright, let alone frozen ones.

  23. Tofurkey?!? by AttillaTheNun · · Score: 3, Insightful
    Someone please explain to me the merits of Tofurkey.

    Why would a vegan/vegetarian give a rats ass if a hunk of tofu tastes like turkey (or a hotdog, hamburger, etc) unless they THIRST FOR THE TASTE OF ANIMAL FLESH!!!

  24. Insightful? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    He talks about killing all hippies and gets modded insightful? I know that some people on slashdot have trouble recognizing a joke when they see one...but seriously...insightful???

    What little trace of faith I once had in the slashdot moderation system is now completely gone.

    And yes I am kinda new here.

  25. On Monday by Kaptain+Kruton · · Score: 2, Funny

    ...on Monday it may be possible to use the technique to resurrect mammoths and other extinct species.

    Why Monday? Does he have something against doing it on Tuesday or Wednesday?