Scientists say that Neanderthals can be cloned. Scientists are considering the possibility of cloning a Neanderthal using DNA from fossils. Neanderthals are believed to be the distant evolutionary cousins of modern homo sapiens that went extinct some 33 thousand years ago. Using the genome of the extinct species along with human stem cells, Doctor George Church, a genetics professor at Harvard School of Medicine, thinks that the procedure could be successfully accomplished. Church is quoted as saying: "I have already managed to attract enough DNA from fossil bones to reconstruct the DNA of the human species largely extinct. Now I need an adventurous female human." There are a few problems that are raised by the idea of cloning a Neanderthal. Most of the embryos that have been implanted by scientists in an effort to clone animals haven't survived. The only other extinct animal to be brought back to life through cloning is a Pyrenean ibex, which took 439 embryos to create one cloned ibex. The Neanderthal clone would have to be birthed by a human mother, and the current rate of successful births would leave many potential host mothers with stillborns or miscarriages. What do you think? Should scientists attempt to clone a Neanderthal?
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