Why don't scientists try to clone well preserved thousand year old mummies such as lady dai?

Answer 1

Why would you clone a mummy

Answer 2

Because a lot of times a mummified body doesn't have enough surviving DNA code to enable a clone to be made, and even if there is it would only be a representation of the physical person, which you can already simulate through computer graphics. Anything you may have wanted to know about the ancient person's original personality wouldn't be an accurate reflection in the clone because personality is a combination of both genetics and environment. It's impossible to exactly replicate the life of the deceased person for the new clone. And that's not even bringing up all the issues around the debate about the ethics of creating a new person out of someone who has already lived and died. If a clone of someone like, for instance, king tut were made it would be interesting, but there would be little actual historical data that you could gain from it.

Answer 3

First of all, they would need an intact cell, which they wouldn't get as the well preserved mummies are dessicated.

Secondly, cloning isn't easy. It's extremely inefficient and difficult and some species are easier to clone than others. As even naturally formed human embryos fail much more than many other species it will probably be extremely difficult to clone a human.

And that's not even getting into the moral issues.

Answer 4

ethical reasons, yes.

but the cells of the tissue you're cloning must be alive in order to clone it. in the modern day we do not have the technology to clone a human (or anything) with only its DNA. the cells MUST BE ALIVE to clone. the body of lady dai is well preserved, but the cells are dead nontheless.

you may have heard of scientists trying to clone a whooly mammoth a while ago. that was the attempt to clone from only DNA. the details were not publicised, but it is a valid hypothesis to say that they failed.

Answer 5

Scientists can barely clone animals. It would be extremley difficult to clone a mummy. Besides, an UPROAR would occur from the Christian community.

Answer 6

Because mummies do not posses the kind of living DNA cells that are required for cloning. You can't make a clone from just any DNA cells.

Answer 7

Because of ethical reasons and the fact that it's much more difficult to clone a human than a cat or a sheep.

Answer 8

Its DNA might have degraded over that extensive term so as that it is unrecoverable. the perspective of cloning is as follows: one million) Separate DNA from between the objective's cells. 2) Implant this DNA right into a makeshift sperm cellular. 3) Inject that sperm into an egg cellular. 4) Implant that egg cellular in a surrogate mom, and enable gestate as favourite. If the great became male, it won't have any egg cells to apply. additionally, because of the fact none are alive at present it may be complicated to locate a surrogate to implant the egg in. Elephants are the closest, yet i wager issues of gestation era and length might happen.

Answer 9

Very good question, I gave you a star for an interesting question. It must be because they have fibbed to us somewhere along the line and they really can't do all they say they can....at least not as completely as they would like for us to believe. Also, since that involves messing around with a human then there are probably laws against it.

Answer 10

Technically, it's just as easy to clone a human as a sheep. So it's very doable. Its just a lot tougher ethically given that many attempts would fail.