Now is the time to make your voice know on whether this technology will infiltrate the mindsets and then the animals over the next century:
The piglet called "Pig 26" is the first animal to be created via "gene editing". It was born four months ago at Edinburgh's Roslin Institute, where Dolly the cloned sheep was created in 1996.
The piglet called "Pig 26" is the first animal to be created via "gene editing". It was born four months ago at Edinburgh's Roslin Institute, where Dolly the cloned sheep was created in 1996.
The new technique, which is faster and more efficient than existing methods, can alleviate major concerns of anti-GM campaigners because it does not involve the use of antibiotic-resistance genes, The Telegraph reported.
Scientists hope it could make genetic engineering of livestock more acceptable to the public and be key to the challenge of feeding the growing global population.
"Gene-editing" is a simple and precise process whereby researchers snipped the animal's DNA and inserted new genetic material, in effect changing a single one of the three billion "letters" that make up its genome.
It has a success rate of ten to 15 per cent, compared with less than one per cent for existing methods, and can be performed on a fertilised egg without the need for complicated cloning techniques.
Pig 26 was engineered to have a gene making it immune to African swine fever, a virus which can kill European pigs within 24 hours of infection.
The gene was taken from wild African pigs, which are naturally immune to the virus but which cannot breed with European species.
Whitelaw said similar techniques could be used to make other livestock such as cattle and sheep immune to a host of diseases.
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