Dolly the sheep, the first animal to be cloned from an adult cell, has been put down after she was found to have a lung disease, the Roslin Institute in Scotland's capital Edinburgh said today.
The decision to put the six-year-old animal to death was taken after a veterinary examination showed that she had a progressive lung disease, a statement from the institute said.
Dolly made scientific history when, in 1996, she became the first mammal to be cloned from an adult cell.
The Roslin Institute is one of the world's leading centres for embryonic research on farm and other animals. Dolly was cloned from the breast cell of a six-year-old adult ewe and born on July 5th, 1996 at the Roslin Institute.
Her birth was only announced seven months later and was heralded as one of the most significant scientific breakthroughs of the decade.
But it also triggered furious debate about the ethics of cloning - a row which has deepened with allegations of human cloning.
Dolly, a Finn Dorset named after the country and western singer Dolly Parton, bred normally on two occasions with a Welsh mountain ram called David, first giving birth to Bonnie in April 1998 and then to three more lambs in 1999.
But alarm bells began ringing in January last year when she was diagnosed with a form of arthritis.
AFP