• Question: If you had one cell, is it possible for them to reproduce to create a small animal or maybe even a human being?

    Asked by simsonadventure365 to Bob, Katie, Nisha, Sallie, Vee on 4 Jul 2012.
    • Photo: Bob Bonwick

      Bob Bonwick answered on 4 Jul 2012:

      well this does happen. When the two sex cells fuse and create one cell, this rapidly divides and becomes an embryo.

      If you are talking about cloning, then you need an omnipotent stem cells, so making one from a skin cell is the most ethical way of doing this (difficult, but really clever science)

    • Photo: Sallie Baxendale

      Sallie Baxendale answered on 4 Jul 2012:

      Cloning is really, really difficult – but it has been done with some animals like sheep and dogs. If you cloned a human they would have the same DNA as the cell that they came from but they wouldnt be exactly the same person, because the environment we grow up plays a large part in shaping our characteritics and personality.

    • Photo: Katie McDonald

      Katie McDonald answered on 5 Jul 2012:

      Well. If the one cell was a fertilised ovum then it’s already happened and you’re the result! If you mean an adult cell, it’s not yet possible, but certainly stem cell research could end up with that sort of thing if someone was aiming towards it.

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