EVENT OF THE MONTH: JULY 2016

5^th July marked the 20th anniversary of the birth of arguably the most famous sheep that ever chewed grass. Dolly was created at The Roslin Institute, Scotland. Dolly was important because she was the first mammal to be cloned from an adult cell. Her birth proved that specialised cells could be used to create an exact copy of the animal they came from.

Dolly was cloned from an egg taken from a Scottish Blackface sheep, and a cell taken from the mammary gland of a sheep. Because Dolly's DNA came from a mammary gland cell—breasts in humans, udders in sheep, she was named after the country singer Dolly Parton.  She was born to her Scottish Blackface surrogate mother on 5th July 1996. 

Dolly's white face was one of the first signs that she was a clone because if she was genetically related to her surrogate mother, she would have had a black face. Dolly was announced to the world on 22nd February 1997. She captured the public's imagination—no small feat for a sheep—and sparked a public debate about the possible benefits and dangers of cloning. In the week following the announcement, The Roslin Institute received 3,000 phone calls from around the world.

Dolly spent her life at The Roslin Institute, and apart from the occasional media appearance, led a normal life. Over the years, Dolly had a total of six lambs with a ram called David. After Dolly gave birth to her last lambs in September 2000, it was discovered that she'd become infected by a virus called JSRV, which causes lung cancer in sheep. Dolly was put to sleep on 14th February 2003, at the age of six.