Human Cloning (Geek-Alert)
So I was sitting at a night-club with some friends this evening discussing literature while the Burlesque performers were practicing getting their pasties gyrating in unison back stage.
Both my friend and I had read all of Heinlein's Lazarus Long stories, however his girl-friend had never heard of them. We covered some of the back-plot including one time when a couple of nefarious young ladies (Hamadryad and Ishtar) took Lazarus's DNA, and through some "Jiggery-Pokery" gave birth to his two female identical twins (Lapis Lazuli and Lorelei Lee).
On the way back to the office, I started thinking on human cloning and how to build a female clone of a male without suffering the problems inherent in Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer that lead to the premature aging of Dolly the cloned sheep.
I believe that part of the problem with current cloning techniques stems from the fact that certain genes of mature adult DNA have been Methylated preventing gene transcription and thus shutting the genes down. It therefore occurred to me that perhaps the best place to extract functional human DNA for cloning would be from the males spermatozoa which would (I believe) be in a Demethylated state ready for use in a zygote and mitotic cell division to become an embryo.
One simply needs to collect enough spermatozoa to statistically guarantee all 46 chromosomes are available for processing. The probability of getting every human chromosome from N sperm should be given by the formula:
PN = (1 - ½(N-1))23
This yields the following probability:
SpermatozoaProbability10%2~0%30.13%44.6%523%648%770%883%991%1095%1198%1299%1399%14~100%15~100%
So given 15 sperm (we keep the number low because of the complex manipulation required), the procedure would be:
Now I just need a biochemist to poke holes in my nefarious plan!
=== UPDATE ===
Someone reminded me that Genetic Recombination can occur in meiosis when producing the gametes. This shuffling of genes would torpedo my approach. What would occur is that the 46 selected chromosomes would not be identical to the parent, and would almost certainly contain duplicate recessive genes. This would result in either a non-viable zygote, or serious genetic diseases.
Both my friend and I had read all of Heinlein's Lazarus Long stories, however his girl-friend had never heard of them. We covered some of the back-plot including one time when a couple of nefarious young ladies (Hamadryad and Ishtar) took Lazarus's DNA, and through some "Jiggery-Pokery" gave birth to his two female identical twins (Lapis Lazuli and Lorelei Lee).
On the way back to the office, I started thinking on human cloning and how to build a female clone of a male without suffering the problems inherent in Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer that lead to the premature aging of Dolly the cloned sheep.
I believe that part of the problem with current cloning techniques stems from the fact that certain genes of mature adult DNA have been Methylated preventing gene transcription and thus shutting the genes down. It therefore occurred to me that perhaps the best place to extract functional human DNA for cloning would be from the males spermatozoa which would (I believe) be in a Demethylated state ready for use in a zygote and mitotic cell division to become an embryo.
One simply needs to collect enough spermatozoa to statistically guarantee all 46 chromosomes are available for processing. The probability of getting every human chromosome from N sperm should be given by the formula:
PN = (1 - ½(N-1))23
This yields the following probability:
SpermatozoaProbability10%2~0%30.13%44.6%523%648%770%883%991%1095%1198%1299%1399%14~100%15~100%
So given 15 sperm (we keep the number low because of the complex manipulation required), the procedure would be:
- Extract the nucleus from all 15 speratozoa.
- Use charge-separation to separate the 23 chromosome groups by mass.
- Use charge-separation on each group to separate each chromosome pair.
- Gather the chromosomes as a shopping list (doubling up on the X).
- Inject into a denucleated human egg cell.
- Find a turkey-baster.
Now I just need a biochemist to poke holes in my nefarious plan!
=== UPDATE ===
Someone reminded me that Genetic Recombination can occur in meiosis when producing the gametes. This shuffling of genes would torpedo my approach. What would occur is that the 46 selected chromosomes would not be identical to the parent, and would almost certainly contain duplicate recessive genes. This would result in either a non-viable zygote, or serious genetic diseases.