(Newser)
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Dolly the cloned sheep died seven years ago, but she lives on in four new clones. “The Dollies,” exact genetic copies of their namesake, were cloned by the scientist behind the research that produced Dolly herself. “Dolly is alive and well. Genetically these are Dolly,” Keith Campbell tells the Daily Mail. Whereas it took 227 eggs to produce a surviving lamb—Dolly—the first time around, this time each Dolly needed only five embryos.
The Dollies were created in order to see if the cloning technique has been improved enough to cut the risk of problems—Dolly died at just six, after suffering health problems including advanced lung disease and arthritis. So far, Campbell says her clones appear healthy and are living “the life of Reilly—they potter around and get fed.”
