Question

What is a goal of human therapeutic cloning?

to transfer cells from an unrelated individual into a patient needing a transplant

to create pluripotent cells for medical research only

to make a new individual, who is genetically identical to a patient needing a transplant

to create pluripotent stem cells using a patient’s nucleus

to extract ES cells from an embryo

Answer 1

Human therapeutic cloning is cloning which uses cloning for treating a patient’s disease. Cells are cloned to form stem cells which can then differentiate into specific types of cells that can be introduced into the patient. Pluripotent stem cells have now being created where in fibroblast cells from the patient are now induced using specific cocktail of transcription factors (Oct4, Sox2, Klf4, c-myc) that can modify the cell nucleus. These fibroblasts are now converted to stem cells, which can then be differentiated to specific cells types such as cardiomyocytes, muscle cells etc. Such cells are called induced pluripotent stem cells (iPS).

Therapeutic cloning does not involve formation of new cloned organism. Formation of new cloned organism is reproductive cloning, which cannot be performed in humans due to ethical constraints. Reproductive cloning involves ES extraction from embryo. Reproductive cloning is used for medical research. Graft Transplantation is transplantation of tissues from unrelated person to the patient needing treatment.

Right choice: to create pluripotent stem cells using a patient’s nucleus.