Five transgenic marmoset offspring - (a) Hisui, (b) Wakaba, (c) Banko, (d) Kei (left) and Kou (right) - after their birth at the Central Institute for Experimental Animals at Japan's Keiko University. via: SMH.
A bunch of scientists monkeyin aroung in Japan have created monkeys that glow in the dark under UV-light.
The genetically modified primates glow green in the dark and can now pass the uber cool traits onto their offspring, the Journal Nature reported.
Glow-in-the-Dark primates have been created years before, these Japanese glow-in-the-dark monkeys are special, as they are the first to be able to pass on the gene to their monkey children, and could lead to science finding cures to human genetic diseases.
The glow in the dark mormoset research has been hailed by medical researches and geneticists as a long sort after step in the progress toward cures for human health gentic disorders.
Glow in the dark Marmosets, Trangenic Marmosets, from Journal Nature.
However, animal rights groups say the Transgenic monkey reasearch by the Japanese team paves the way for the production of colonies of primates conceived to suffer a plethora of cruel illnesses and dangerous medical experiments.
Due to huamanity's close genetic relationship with primates like marmosets, some animal rights groups have voiced conern that the glow in the dark transgenetic techniques could even be used on humans.
From the San Francisco Chronicle:
In the new work, Erika Sasaki of the Central Institute for Experimental Animals in Kawasaki, Japan, and her colleagues conducted a series of experiments using marmosets, a small monkey common in South America that matures and reproduces quickly.
The researchers modified a virus called a lentivirus to carry a jellyfish gene known as GFP (for green fluorescent protein) into the genetic material of the marmosets' cells. The gene is used commonly in research because it is easy to track - cells where the gene is active glow green when exposed to fluorescent light.
The researchers used the genetically engineered virus to insert the jellyfish gene into 80 marmoset embryos, which they then transferred into the wombs of 50 females.
Seven pregnancies resulted in five offspring, four of which showed signs of the jellyfish gene in their hair roots, skin, blood cells and other tissues. Under fluorescent light, the skin on the soles of their feet glowed bright green.
Most importantly, eggs from one of the females and sperm from one of the males had the gene, and the researchers' paper said the male's sperm was used to produce at least one second-generation offspring with the gene.
The researchers said they had since produced four offspring - two from the male and two from the female - three of which glowed green.
"The birth of this transgenic marmoset baby is undoubtedly a milestone," wrote Gerald Schatten of the University of Pittsburgh and Shoukrat Mitalipov of the Oregon Health and Sciences University in an article published with the Japanese paper.
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