DR. FRANKENSTEIN, I PRESUME? The scientist who cloned the first adult BY ANDREW ROSS “Researchers Astounded ... Fiction Becomes True and Dreaded Possibilities Are Raised." So went the headlines in Sunday's New York Times about Dr. Ian Wilmut, the embryologist in Edinburgh who has made history by creating a lamb from the DNA of an adult sheep. The research, performed at the Roslin Institute in Edinburgh, was sponsored by a drug company, PPL Therapeutics. Dr. Wilmut says the primary purpose of the cloning is to advance the development of drug therapies to combat certain life-threatening human diseases. Other scientists, especially in the United States, appear to have adopted a more apocalyptic view of the news. "It basically means there are no limits," Dr. Lee Silver, a biologist at Princeton University, told the New York Times. "It means all of science fiction is true." Dr. Ronald Munson, a medical ethicist at the University of Missouri, said, "This technology is not, in principle, policeable." Munson even speculated about the possibility of cloning the dead. Are such scenarios remotely possible? And if drug treatment is the main priority, how soon will we see animal clone-based drugs on the market? Salon spoke with Wilmut by telephone from his home in Edinburgh. Science fiction. Cloning the dead. A technology out of control. What do you make of such reactions to your work? I think they're over the top. The point is that what we thought happens in all life is that you have a single fertilized egg and as it divides, it progressively differentiates and you get brain and muscle and all of the different kinds of cells that we have, People assumed until now that this was an irreversible process. And what we have shown is that it's not. Now people will have to think in slightly different ways about the mechanisms that control these changes -- for example, about what happens when things go wrong and you get a cancer instead of a normal development. So it is going to open people's eyes a lot in terms of biology. And does it mean that cloning humans is possible? We don't know. It is quite likely that it is possible, yes. But what we've said all along -- speaking for both the (Roslin) Institute and the PPL staff -- is that we would find it ethically unacceptable to think of doing that. We can't think of a reason to do it. If there was a reason to copy a human being, we would do it, but there isn't. Is the idea of cloning the dead totally fanciful? Yep. Still, even if you can't clone the dead and you see no reason to clone the living, the genie is out of the bottle, so to speak. Others might find reasons for human cloning, and they may not have the same standard of ethics as you. That does worry me, both in principle and in detail. It worries me in detail because the successes we have at present are of such low efficiency that it would really be quite appalling to think of doing that with people. I would feel desperately sorry for the women and the children that were involved. Why? Because the clone could turn out to be some kind of monster? It's possible. Perhaps you don't know that in the first experiment that we reported, five lambs were born alive and three of them died quickly. There was nothing monstrous, they just simply died. That in itself is very distressing if you think of a mother who carries a child and it dies within a few days of birth. Your main goal, you have said, is to develop health-related products from animal clones. In what areas, specifically? Hemophilia. With animals, you could make the clotting factors which are missing. It could also be beneficial for cystic fibrosis. What's the difference between using animal clones and other kinds of biotechnology techniques? Speed and efficiency. You could take cells from an animal, grow them in the laboratory and make very precise genetic changes -- it's called gene targeting -- which you insert in the cloned offspring. So, for example, you put into the cells of the offspring DNA sequences which would say, "Don't make this particular milk protein, but instead make clotting factor 8," which is needed for hemophilia. You can do that now, but by using a much more primitive technique. Cloning and gene targeting requires fewer animals. It will be quicker, which means new health products will come on line more quickly. There's another major advantage. Presuming this technique with sheep will successfully extend to cattle and then to pigs, it will speed xeno-transplantation -- using organs from pigs to treat human patients. That can be done now, but what happens now is that you put a human protein into the pig organ which kind of damps down the immune response in the transplant patient. Now with gene targeting, we can do that, but we can also change the surface of the cells, so that they would be less antigenic when the pig organ is put into a human patient -- which makes it more likely that organ transplantation will work. So, instead of waiting for a human donor, we'll be seeing many more animal organ-to-human transplants. Yes, with pig organs in particular. And who would be helped the most? Well, there is a need for more hearts and more kidneys. At present people die before human hearts can be made available to them. There have been attempts to use baboon transplants in AIDS patients. Yes, but people feel it's more acceptable to think of using pigs because baboons seem so much more -- -- human? That's right. Aware of their environment. With animal cloning research, will it be possible to go in and fix genetic defects in humans? For example, there are already tests for a predisposition to breast cancer. I think that is so far away that it's not really credible. I mean you're quite right theoretically. But the efficiencies we have at the present time and our understanding are so naive and primitive that you wouldn't contemplate doing it. I think we could contribute in a smaller way to certain genetic diseases -- breast cancer is not one that I've thought of -- but, for example, with cystic fibrosis. It has been suggested that we study the role of the gene which is defective in people who suffer from cystic fibrosis with the hope that better therapies can be developed. We could also provide model test animals in which methods of gene therapy can be developed. Which is being done with mice. Yes, but mice are so different and so small that experimentation is very difficult. Sheep would be much more appropriate. Do you see a therapy for cystic fibrosis based on animal clones in your lifetime? Yes. I'm 52, I reckon I've got 20 years. I'm fairly comfortable predicting we'll see something in that time period. In addition to drug therapy for humans, your research has major implications for animals. Yes, it may open a whole range of things we can't imagine at the present time. Remember, we only know about what, 5 or 10 percent of the animal genes? But there is a particular project which is of immediate relevance in Britain concerning the disease scrapie. Mad Cow Disease? That's right. What people believe is that the agent which causes scrapie in sheep causes BSE (Bovine Spongiform Encephalitis) in cows and some of the CJD (Creuzfeld-Jacob Disease) in humans. It is believed to start with a particular gene in sheep. Now what if we could modify that gene; could we make sheep that are resistant to scrapie? That's very important for sheep, but also for BSE and CJD in humans. When? Twenty years or so. There is also talk of "supercows" producing enormous quantities of milk. Could it be made cholesterol-free, by the way? There are all sorts of questions like that. The answer to them is, we don't know. One thing I would say is that history shows that people are very bad at predicting the way that technology will be used. Any implications for world hunger? Not immediately. But if we can maybe make animals resistant to some diseases -- to the tsetse fly, for example -- it is quite possible that we can contribute to a whole range of things. You've been working on this project for 10 years. Did you ever ask yourself, "Am I Dr. Frankenstein here? I know what I want to achieve but am I contributing to something I don't want to see happen?" Of course. And we've tried to have this information released responsibly to journalists like yourself, to ethicists, to people concerned with legislation, because what we want is to stimulate an informed public discussion of the way in which the techniques might be misused as well as used and to ensure legislation was put in place to prevent misuse. But what we're also concerned with as well is that we don't throw the baby out with the bathwater. There are real potential benefits, and it's important that the concern to prevent misuse doesn't also prevent the really useful benefits that can be gained from this research. What misuse are you most concerned with? Any kind of manipulation with human embryos should be prohibited. Are you concerned that your work will be stopped? I have some concerns about it. I totally understand that people find this sort of research offensive, and I respect their views. It's also possible for a minority to have very large influence. Now, if society says it doesn't want us to do this kind of research, well, that's fine. But I think it has to be an overall view made by an informed population. Assuming it goes forward, when will we see the first concrete applications?
I think there will be animals on the ground with interesting new products
in three years. I think we'll come up with clotting factors, possibly in
cattle as well as in sheep. Of course there will be a long time for testing
the products before they go into commercial use. But there will be animals
that are able to secrete new proteins, different proteins, in three years.
CLICK YOUR BETS, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN
Internet gambling is the next BY ERICA REX Gambling, like the other more dubious diversions of modern life, has rushed wildly to get a piece of the Internet action in the past few years. There are hundreds of Web sites devoted to some form of gambling, and more are being added every month. Many of them are advertisements for licensed and regulated casinos. Others are informational or "how to" sites. And an increasing number are actual online gambling operations. The problem is, online gambling, at least in most parts of the United States, may be illegal. The stakes are enormous. Americans shell out approximately $550 billion a year on gambling, not just in casinos but at the racetrack, on sports books and state-run lotteries, in card rooms and church-run bingo halls. It is understandable that Internet entrepreneurs would want to get in on it. One of them is the International Gaming and Communications Corporation (IGC) of Blue Bell, Pa. Since 1992, IGC has specialized in gambling on major sporting events taking place anywhere in the world. IGC made it legal by opening offshore accounts for its betting customers through a subsidiary, Sports International Ltd. of Grenada, West Indies, and letting the punters place bets using a toll-free number from anywhere in the world. IGC's International Sports Book has generated approximately $50 million annually in telephone wagers. In May 1995, it accepted its first wager transmitted over the Internet. Since then, a number of sites have sprung up offering sports-book wagering, with offshore accounts, on the Internet. Some sites use play money accounts for pretend blackjack, roulette or slots. IGC, which put a prototype blackjack game on its Sports Book Web site last summer, wants to be the first to implement real-money, live casino-style gambling on the Internet. The company says it plans to "go live" with its Internet bets in mid-March. "We are opening accounts now, though," said Jeffrey Erb, spokesman for IGC. When it opens, its Global Casino will feature the world's first Internet slot machine tournament, offering players prizes from $10,000 to $1 million. With Global Casino, IGC expects to capture at least 1 percent of the worldwide wagering market. That would amount to well over $1 billion per year. Is it legal? "We're entirely legal," says Erb. "All gambling accounts are offshore. The money transactions are done through an expatriate subsidiary. The way we're set up, there's nothing we're doing that anyone can criticize." State and federal law enforcement officials are not so sure. The National Association of Attorneys General and the U.S Department of Justice are closely watching a case working its way through the courts in Minnesota in which the state is taking on a company called On-Ramp Internet Computer Services. Basing its case on consumer protection laws, the state is accusing the company of misleading customers by claiming that they can legally bet through its service -- which is based in Nevada, where gambling is legal -- when in fact to do so would violate both state and federal law. "Gambling in Minnesota, either advertising it or doing it, is illegal," said Carolyn Hamm, the state's assistant attorney general. "It doesn't matter where the Web site is based or where the monetary transaction takes place. If people can access the site in a state where gambling is illegal, it's illegal." There is no certainty that the courts will agree. Existing law that prohibits using wire communications for transmitting bets in interstate or foreign commerce does not specifically address the Internet. And until the law is clarified, most Internet gambling entrepreneurs seem to consider themselves immune. Fortunes are riding on the outcome. "From the time that the Sports Book went online, we've seen a 20 percent increase in volume of wagering over the telephone-based games," says Michael Oryl, president of Intersphere, the IGC subsidiary that developed the Sports Book and Global Casino Web pages. "We anticipate nothing but greater revenues in the future." Ignored in the chase for profits are the potential social problems a new explosion of gambling could cause. And then there are the regulatory issues: How will states prevent neophyte Internet gamblers from getting ripped off by sleazy operators? And who is responsible for blocking transmission of gambling sites to minors?
In spite of these concerns, it seems that there is no bucking a trend. "Home is where the (gambling) market is going," said Jason Ader, a gaming analyst at Bear Stearns.
Erica Rex is a recipient of the National Magazine Award for Fiction. She also writes on technology. |
