A CLONED goat fetus in a Texas lab is raising hopes of one day producing herds of genetically modified cattle that are immune to BSE. Researchers at Texas A&M University and Howard Hughes Medical Institute in New York genetically modified the fetus to be almost completely lacking in prions, the proteins which in their rogue form cause BSE in cattle and scrapie in sheep.
Animals that cannot produce normal prions are resistant to BSE-like diseases. “Knockout” mice can be created with a non-functioning prion gene, but attempts to make knockout versions of larger animals have failed.
So Mark Westhusin and…
