Hello there, my name is Emery, and I am a cloned dog embryo. Yes, I know, you probably have never had a conversation with a cloned embryo and if you have…. let’s just say I am concerned for your well-being. I wasn’t always an embryo, it was actually what I aspired to be when I grew up. When I was a youngster, I was a little oocyte, or unfertile egg. In fact, there were several of us, all hanging out at the local petri dish when we were recruited to go to school. The school was named SCNT or somatic cell nuclear transfer. During our education, we found that the DNA that was in our nucleus (our brain), was really like most high school students – we were only operating on half a brain. Our nucleus only contained one set of chromosomes (it was haploid). So, in a class called Enucleation, our half brain was removed, and a full brain was inserted from a cell line or Genetic Preservation (it was diploid). I instantly became smarter as a reconstructed oocyte! And with the help of another class called Fusion, we really began to click. After that invigorating experience we became fused couplets. As an upper classman, I entered the culture period, where I began to cleave and grow and divide and in general, I got a lot smarter. Eventually, I graduated, with honors, as a full-fledged embryo. After graduation, I went on to transfer into a recipient or surrogate mother. And like most college students, not all my fellow embryos made it. But I am happy to report that I did, and I became a gestating pregnancy. After a gestation period of about 68 days, I was born into the world, as a bouncing, baby, happy, healthy cloned puppy. That is when the fun began. In the puppy nursery, I learned how to drink and sleep….and then sleep and drink. My fellow embryo graduates were there to play with me and we were waited on hand and foot by some really pretty puppy care takers. It was like 9 straight weeks of spring break. I didn’t think life could get any better but today, was the best day of my life. My boy came to pick me up. He has toys and balls for me, and I can tell, he really, really likes me. I think we’re going to be best friends. Who says dreams don’t come true…. even for an embryo.
-Diane & Dennis