PLANT AND ANIMAL BIOTECHNOLOGY STB2143

UNIVERSITI MALAYSIA SARAWAK

FACULTY OF RESOURCE SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

STB2143 Plant & Animal Biotechnology

Title: The Advantages & Disadvantages of Animal
Biotechnology

Lecturer: Dr. Lee Kui Soon

Date of submission: 9 April 2010

Group members Matric number

Diyanah Musfirah bt Jamal 20873
Dwenovel Dennis John 22817
Julianne Anak Philip Attan 21169
Mohd Noharkie b. Amir Amzah 21581
Nurul Ain Binti Abdul Mattin 22017
Sabatini Anak Jihob 22218

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TABLE OF CONTENT
CONTENTS PAGE
Introduction 3

Advantages & Disadvantages

o Animal Cloning 4

o Transgenic Animal 5

o Artificial Insemination 7

o Animal Tissue Culture 9

Conclusions 10

References 12

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Animal Biotechnology – An Introduction

Animal biotechnology is a revolutionize concept of biotechnology. Human ultimate aim

towards the identification, prevention, diagnosis and therapy of genetic disorder relates to
various fields such as tissue culture, immunology, genetics, microbiology and biochemistry
which contribute to the overall development of animal biotechnology. In turn, animal
biotechnology contributed in its own way to all fields of Biological Sciences (Manjula
Shenoy, 2007). The contribution does not only revolve in human healthcare, but also in the
field of agricultural.

In a more simple way, animal biotechnology can be defined as the use of science and
engineering to modify living organism. The goal is mainly to produce products, to improve
animals, using knockout gene technology to make animal with a specific inactivated gene
and producing nearly identical animal by cloning (Animal Biotechnology Issue Brief, 2006).

The rapid development of animal biotechnology had contributed to countless impacts on

the world we are living in now. The advantages of the technology are enormous yet
disadvantages of the technology still cannot be avoided. Here, we had decided to discuss on
the advantages and the disadvantages of the main animal biotechnology applications such
as animal cloning, transgenic animals, selective animal breeding and also animal tissue
culture. There are vast more applications in animal biotechnology, but these four
applications are the most significant ones.

Figure 1: Animal biotechnology; the manipulations of animal using genetic engineering.

Figure 1: Animal biotechnology, the manipulation of animals using genetic engineering.

Figure 1: Animal biotechnology, the manipulation of animals using genetic engineering.

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Figure 1: Animal biotechnology, the manipulation of animals using genetic engineering.

Figure 1: Animal biotechnology, the manipulation of animals using genetic engineering.

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Advantages and Disadvantages of Animal Cloning

Animal cloning is commonly defined as the process of making identical genomics copies of
an original animal (Georgia Agriculture Education, 2005). An example is somatic cell nuclear
transfer (SCNT), the technique which created Dolly, the sheep in 1996. Since then,
researchers have done cloning on a number of different animals, including cows, pigs, goats,
horses, mice, cats, and dogs. The process is still not perfect, however, attempt to create
more clone are generally moving to more succeed stage.

Scientists have done and developed animal cloning technique to ease life in the future for
human and also animals. Here, come the advantages of animal cloning. Agriculture
researchers are interested in cloning livestock such as cows, pigs, sheep, goats, and poultry
primarily for the purpose of breeding to create copies of high quality animals. Currently,
farmers use the animals that have the best genetics for some desired quality such as fast
growth, leaner meat, or high milk production. For example is breeding animals to produce
offspring that will have similar qualities. By cloning these top breeders, farmers can extend
their reproductive potential and create whole herds or flocks with these uniform
characteristics.

Figure 2: Dolly the sheep, the first mammal cloned from an adult cell.

When there are pros, there must be cons. The limitation of animal cloning arises from
numerous level of concern such as animal welfare, safety of food consumption, loss of
biodiversity, ethical objections and a lot more.

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In animal welfare, the inefficient of cloning poses threat and suffering to animals. Despite
years of research, over 95% of cloning attempts fail, even with extensive veterinary
intervention. Birth defects, physiological impairments, illness, and premature death
continue to be the norm, not the exception, with cloning. Even healthy clones have
unexpectedly developed problems during their life range. We can say that even they are
healthy at birth, they might develop health problem later in their life.

The health problems associated with cloned animals, according to Ian Wilmut, who is the
leader scientist involved in cloning of Dolly, has warned that even small imbalances of
hormone, protein, or fat in a clone’s body could lead to a problem to the consumer.
Particularly those who appear healthy but have concealed illness that appear with surprise
later in life, perhaps is due to the consumption of these food products which derived from
those animals.

Thirdly, the lost of biodiversity of the naturally grown animals to those which are cloned. As
we know, a cloned animal are genetically modified and are more resistance to the
environment which will lead to the stress of the naturally grown animal.

Other ethical objections to cloning animals is the concern that animal cloning will lead to
human cloning, that cloning is unreligious, or that cloning is just not “right.” Some people
have the opinion that cloning is an act of going against God, in other words, playing God.

Figure 3: Cloning of animal makes it possible to create genetically identical animals

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Advantages and disadvantages of Transgenic Animal

Transgenic animal is an example of development in the area of animal biotechnology.

Transgenic animal refers to an animal which has been deliberately modified in the genome
(FELASA September 1992, revised February 1995). The foreign DNA is introduced to the
animal, using recombinant DNA technology. The foreign DNA must be transmitted through
the germ line so that every cell including the germ cell of the animal contains the same
modified genetic material.

Figure 4: Examples of transgenic animals.

The advantage of creating transgenic animal is that the animals can be designed to grow
bigger and more rapidly. Animals are also being produced to possess traits beneficial to
humans, such as meat with more protein and less fat, eggs with less cholesterol, milk
containing pharmaceutical products, or even tissues and organs suitable for human
transplantation (www.ens-newswire.com). The main advantage of creating transgenic
animal is the ability to improve livestock of domesticated animal according to the specific
economic traits. A very good example is the transgenic goat, namely “The Spider Goat”.
These transgenic goats were modified in such a way that the goats can produce milk
containing spider silk. The resulting spider silk is extremely strong and valuable for the
production of body armour.

Other uses of this transgenic combination include growing tissue on scaffolding, or

supporting framework. This then can be used as a temporary skin substitute for healing
wounds or burns or as replacement cartilage, heart valves, cerebrospinal shunts, or even
collagen tubes to guide re-growth of nerves that have been injured. Another grand
advantage of transgenic animal was its contribution in biomedical research. For example,
the production of disease model in which the animal was genetically manipulated to exhibit

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disease symptoms so that effective treatment can be studied. Besides, the successful
creation of cancer resistance mouse that was resistant to spontaneous and artificially
introduced tumour had provides valuable ideas for therapeutic intervention strategies.

Figure 5: Spider goat; selected spider DNA is incorporated into the goat.
embryos

There can be many disadvantages of the transgenic organisms. However, they are less as
compared to advantages. The disadvantage is that these human-designed creatures have
the potential to harm certain native species of animals or plants. It can also potentially
affect the environment, thus altering the living conditions of many species. Other than that,
the introduction of transgenic may also affect the direction of evolution and eventually
decrease the gene pool. It was believed that the introduction of transgenic animals can blur
the lines between species (www.actionbioscience.org). In addition, transgenic animals are
costly to produce and they have high value. The cost of making one transgenic animal
ranges from $20,000 to $300,000, and only a small portion of the attempts succeed in
producing a transgenic animal.

Figure 6: More examples of transgenic animals.

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Advantages and Disadvantages of Artificial Insemination

Artificial insemination is the first great biotechnology applied on organisms such as animals
and plants. This technique involves the collection of sperm from male, then processed,
stored at optimum temperature and artificially introduced to the female reproductive tract
for conception purposes. This method is widely used in cattle and other farm animals.

Figure 7a Figure 7b Figure 7c

Figure 7a: Artificial vagina

Figure 7b & 7c: Examples of animals involves in artificial insemination

There are a few advantages regarding artificial insemination but the major one is that this
technique is able to make possible maximum use for better-quality sires, thus producing
more high quality dairy and beef products. This is because one dairy sire can provide semen
for more than 60,000 services, compared to natural breeding which can only use less than
100 matings per year. In associated with that, this technique also reduces the occurring of
infectious genital diseases among the sires.

Other than that, the breeder does not need to maintain a herd sire and thus can avoid the
difficulties accompanied with the management of a bull. It helps to regulate the breeding
programme and is cost effective too, since the dairyman does not have to purchase a new
herd sire in every two years to avoid inbreeding. Besides that, the technique of artificial
insemination also can be made useful in cross breeding for hybrid vigor by quickly
transporting the semen via air to different continents.

Further side advantages are the difficulty of size and weight management can be overcome,
the increase in the rate of conception in females is highly achieved, and outstanding animals
located apart can be mated. Old, heavy and injured sires can also be used without wasting
them.

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Although this artificial insemination technique is widely used nowadays, there are still major
constrain that prevent its further development. The major concern is regarding ethical
issues which general public is against any sex related researches. They also fear that this
technique of breeding animal may produce more abnormalities. Influential cattle breeders
opposed this artificial insemination believing that it will cause loss to their bull market,
making it hard to secure funds for supporting research.

Artificial insemination needs extra labour, facilities, and managerial skills compared to
natural service. Highly trained personnel are needed to manage the sire, hence special
training, skill and practice is needed. Besides, it demands the knowledge of reproduction
structure and function from the operator making it time consuming. Only by doing this a
proper implementation of the technique can be successfully done. Utilization of only a few
sires also may affect the genetic base. Thus, samples should be collected from young sires as
many as possible.

In addition to that, this technique needs high sanitary conditions and clean instruments to
avoid low fertility rates. The selection of bulls also must be very rigid. Finally, the
preservation and transportation of semen is difficult under severe climatic conditions like
those prevailing in most parts of India.

Figure 8a: Artificial insemination on dog. Figure 8b: Artificial insemination of horse.

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Animal Tissue Culture

Animal tissue culture is basically the technique of keeping animal tissues alive, outside the
body of an organism and growing it in a suitable culture medium containing mixture of
nutrients either in solid or liquid form. The general advantage of tissue culture is that it is
possible to control the growth environment of the culture itself. The physiochemical
environment and the physiological environment can be maintained or be set constantly to
meet the culture requirements and needs so it can grow optimally.

Looking deeper into the application, the vast advantage of animal tissue culture is that it
provides a way to produce monoclonal antibody. Monoclonal antibody has been
enormously contributing to medical research for diagnosis of disease. Other than that,
monoclonal antibody is currently used in immunodetection and radioimmunoteherapy of
cancer and some other method can even target only the cell membranes of cancerous cell
(Chaudhari et al., 1994).

Figure 9(a) Figure 9(b)

Figure 9(a) shows the representation of monoclonal antibody actions, while Figure 9(b) shows the
welcoming in-vitro meat. Both are using animal tissue culture techniques.

Another advantage is the mass productions of vaccine using biotechnology technique

namely the animal cell culture technique. Animal cell culture has the capability to offer a
predictable, rapid and responsive method for production of well-tolerated and effective
vaccines, with low levels of adverse. The common cells used in cell culture are the
mammalian kidney cells. All in all, animal tissue culture help us to understand better the
intercellular activity, intracellular flux or stuff moving around in the cell (signal transduction

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and calcium mobilization), cell-cell interactions, toxicology, tissue engineering and even
immunology (R. Ian Freshney).

In addition, scientists are currently struggling in making in-vitro meat a reality. An advantage
of such animal tissue culture application is the possibility of satisfiying the increasing global
demand of meet. Imagine the production of meat without the need of killing animals; it is
going to a major breakthrough in animal tissue culture history.

However, there are also limitations and disadvantages of animal tissue culture. Expertise
and skills are needed for animal tissue culturing. This is important so that behaviour of cells
in culture can be interpreted and regulated properly. Lack of knowledge and skills in
handling the apparatus or media may introduce cross-contamination with other cell lines.

The major draw back of animal tissue culture is the massive expenditure of effort and
material, yet resulting in the production of relatively little tissue (Manjula Shenoy, 2007).
Cost effective production of not only animal tissue culture, but also other type of cell culture
is difficult to achieve and are still under extensive research.

Next, dedifferentiation (changes from a complex state to a more simple state) and selection
may also occur during animal cell culture. As a result, characteristic common to the tissue
from which the cell has been isolated have the possibility to be lost and disappear. Plus,
unstable aneuploid chromosome constitution can also take place (Manjula Shenoy, 2007).

Figure 10: The mammalian kidney cells;

commonly used in cell culture vaccine
production.

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Conclusion

All the pros and contrast stated above showed that animal biotechnology is no longer a
matter of pleasure to the society, but also as part of human necessity to survive. Animal
biotechnology is very important as they bring much more advantages than disadvantages. In
animal cloning, transgenic animal, animal cell culture and artificial insemination, they all
bring benefits to human such as farmers because they can grow more dairy animals and
gain lots of dairy products in short time giving more profits. These biotechnology
applications also bring somewhat miracles to the medical world as they can provide
vaccines, stem cells and organs for transplantation which are absurd in the era before this.
Human born physically impaired can now live normally with the help of this technology.

As the world grows into a more sophisticated era, society’s mindsets are getting much
complicated, thus difficult to please. They can accept this technology at once and rejecting
them then by arising lots of questions regarding biosafety issues. The main constrain in
animal biotechnology is the debate of ethics and animal rights. The limitation concerning on
ethics are significantly hard to oppose due to the protest against the scientists acclaiming
they are ‘Playing God’. In the case of animal rights, the major concern is that these
biotechnology applications produce physically defect animals and decrease their gene pool,
altering their nature breeding state, also giving impacts on the environment.

Despite the limitations that this animal biotechnology brings, they cannot rise above the
benefits that it brings. The society should be well exposed to the reason why
biotechnologists develop this technology in the first place. Shrinking resources is forcing
them to explore possibility, searching for alternatives to meet the demands of changing
world as well as continuing life support. The limitations can be overcome eventually by
further research and development. Now it is in the hands of the society whether or not they
want to accept it and give the biotechnologist time to make further improvements in the
field as this field is still new and ongoing. The disadvantages are always there but efforts are
continuously being made to reduce them, giving a brighter, secure future for all organisms
in this world.

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References

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March 22, 2010, from http://www.world-
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D.W. Webb. (2003). Artificial Insemination in Dairy Cattle. Animal Science Department, Florida
Cooperative Extension Service, Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, University of
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Foote, R.H.2002. The history of artificial insemination: Selected notes and notables. P-8. Retrieved
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Rittne, M. & Cummings, D. (1999). Center of immerging issues - The Industrialization of Transgenic
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Lazaroff, C. (2008). Transgenic animals could pose environmental threat. Retrieved March 23, 2010
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Shenoy, M. (2007). Animal biotechnology. Retrieved March 23, 2010 from

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MedicalNewsToday. (n.d). The benefits of animal biotechnology. Retrieved March 22, 2010, from
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Studentsguidein. (2009). Development of biotechnology.Retrieved April, 6 2010, from

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A Dictionary of Biology. (2004). "perfusion techniques”. Retrieved March 27, 2010,

from http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/O6-perfusiontechniques.html

Marie A. Di Berardino, Ph.D Cloning: Past Present and the Exciting Future. Retrieved on April 8, 2010
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Georgia Agriculture Education Curriculum Office (2005) – Animal cloning; To Clone or Not to Clone.
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Dr Lee Kui Soon (2010) - Animal biotech lecture notes, Lec 1 Introduction

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