Fwd: Researchers Find Big Risk of Defect in Cloning Animals

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http://partners.nytimes.com/2001/03/25/science/25CLON.html?Partner=MSNNews & RefId\

=PjxYEFnnunNF-KZO

 

Here is the link to the NY Times article by Gina Kolata.

 

In a previous post I said that many of the problems scientists are running

into with cloning reads like a list of Jing Deficiency symptoms. Here is an

intro to Jing, aka Essence, for readers new to TCM.

 

Most people have a far easier time understanding the concept of Qi, Yin,

Yang, and even Shen than that of Jing. Jing is translated as Essence.

 

When two people come together for sex, there is an exchange and blending of

sexual energies. When a man and a woman have sex and conception results,

the sexual energy blends to form " Pre-Heaven Jing " in the newly conceived

individual. Both the father and the mother supply Jing.

 

The developing embryo and fetus has no independent Jing of its own. It's

totally dependent on the Pre-Heaven Jing supplied by the mother and father

and on nourishment from the mother's Kidneys. (Maciocia, Foundations, p. 38)

One of the functions of Jing is it acts like a blueprint and master

control. It turns things on an off during development. In Western terms,

think heredity and DNA, though like so many TCM terms, Jing cannot be

reduced to Western concepts. Jing includes many of the functions of DNA and

the laws of heredity but isn't limited to these.

 

After the baby in born, the baby starts to manufacture its own Jing. This is

called Post-Heaven Jing. The Pre-Heaven Jing comes from the parents at

conception and before birth; the Post-Heaven Jing is made by the individual

after birth. " The Pre-Heaven Essence origninates from the parents, the

Post-Heaven Essence originates from food. " (From " The Golden Mirror of

Medical Collection " , cited in Foundations, Maciocia, p. 38). As one

probably can tell from the quote, the Stomach and Spleen plays a major role

in rather or not an individual is going to have enough Post-Heaven Jing.

 

Post-Heaven Jing is a general term to indicate that made by the individual

after birth.

 

Kideny Jing is a more specific term, and this is the one to remember. It's

derived from both the Pre-Heaven and Post-Heaven Jing. It's both hereditary

and can be replenished. The Kidney Jing is stored in the Kidneys, but a lot

of it also is in the 8 Extraordinary meridians, including the Governor

Vessel which runs up the middle of the back and the Conception Vessel which

runs up the middle of the front of the body.

 

Kidney Jing Deficiency (and problems with the Kidneys storing Jing)

frequently have many of the symptoms of Kidney Yang and Kidney Yin

Deficiency PLUS problems having to do with development and maturity. For

example the bones don't develop properly, there may be premature aging, the

mentrual cycle may be messed up (though Jing disorder is not the only

possible cause of this), the hair may be prematurely gray, there may be

congngenital retardation, the genitals may fail to develop properly, there

may be hereditary enzyme problems, birth defects, and a host of other

genetic disorders.

 

What's happening with cloned animals are things are various developmental

abnormalities. Things like enlarged hearts, lungs that fail to develop

properly, and enormous obesity once the animals reach a certain age.

 

But there's another aspect of Jing which appears to have relevance to

cloning. Jing governs major developmental cycles in individuals. In human

females, Jing follows 7 year cycles, and in human males, Jing follows 8 year

cycles. (Or, at least it did until we started fooling around with Mother

Nature so much and doing things like loading cattle and chickens up with

antibiotics and various hormones.) Jing cycles mark changes in development

through our lives. Things like the loss of the baby teeth and the adult

teeth coming in, the loss of adult teeth in old age, sexual maturity, the

time of the greatest physical strength, the decline of old age, etc.

 

In cloning, sexual energies from a male and female do not combine. Instead

of the sperm from the male uniting with the egg of the female, the nucleus

of the female's egg is scooped out and a fully formed cell from an

individual is placed in the egg. The egg is then implanted in a female's

womb. If the process is successful, an exact replica of the individual

animal from which the cell was taken is produced.

 

Humans have 23 pairs of chromosomes (46). The mother provides 23 single

strands, and the father supplies 23 single strands of chromosomes.

(Chromosomes contain the genes.) These unite into 23 pairs.

 

Reproduction is not as simple as a special cell in the female dividing into

two egg cells, and a special cell in the male dividing into two sperm cells,

each with 23 single strands of chromosomes. Remember meiosis from high

school biology? This is the process by which the spermatogonium in the male

and the primary oocyte in the female become sperm and egg. Meiosis occurs

in two stages. In the male the original spermatogonium becomes 4 sperm, each

with 23 single strands of chromosomes. In the female, if fertilization

occurs, meiosis results in one fertilized egg with 23 single strands of

chromosomes and 3 non-functioning polar bodies. A great deal of shuffling of

genetic information occurs during meiosis.

 

The cell created by the union of sperm and egg is called a zygote. The

zygote has 23 pairs of chromosomes - half from each parent. If everything

goes well, this cell divides into 2 identical cells. These two cells divide

into 4 cells. The 4 cells divide into 8, the 8 into 16, and so on. The

morula (solid ball of cells) begins to grow. After a few days, the morula

becomes a blastocyst (hollow ball of cells). There is an inner cell mast

that becomes the embryo proper.

 

Then, for reasons and processes unknown to Western science, cells begin to

differentiate. First they start to differentiate into layers, and then

cells in each of the layers start to differentiate into various parts of the

body. For example, ectodermal cells start to become the nervous sytem,

hair, nails, glands of the skin, etc. Mesodermal cells start to become all

types of muscle cells, bone tissue, blood, lymph vessels, kidenys. The

endodermal cells start to differentiate into the epithelial linings of the

repiratory tract, the urinary bladder, etc. In time, head and limbs start

to appear. The eyes begin to form.

 

A cell in a human body (or an animal body) contains ALL of the genes the

organism has. But for some reason, something starts to switch genes on and

off. For example, the genes that determine eye color get switched on in the

cells that become the irises of the eyes but not in the cells that become

blood or the kidneys. Western science has yet to figure out a mechanism or

why certain things happen at certain times. TCM would say these are

manifestations of Jing.

 

In reading the part of the article that talks about Western theories as to

why there are so many problems associated with cloning, keep in mind both

the stages of meiosis and the TCM concept of Jing, particularly the part

about Jing having to do with stages of development.

 

" No one knows how the egg reprograms an adult cell's genes, but that,

scientists think is the source of the cloning calamities that can occur.

The problem, they say, seems to be that an egg must do a task in minutes of

hours that normally takes months or years. "

 

In other words, instead of an egg and a sperm uniting to become a zycote

(about 24 hours after fertilization), the zycote becoming a morula, the

morula that becomes a blastocyst that implants itself into the wall of the

uterus at about 6 days or a week, the blastocyst becoming an embryo after a

couple of weeks, and the embryo becoming a fetus after about 8 weeks, the

process is starting out with a fully formed adult cell instead of with a

zygote. A cell which is already differentiated has to first become somewhat

undifferentiated and produce other cells that then start to differentiate.

What's turing genes on and off in in normal pregnancies or in cloned

pregnancies? What's determining when stages of maturation begin and end in

normal pregnancies or cloned pregnacies?

 

From a TCM standpoint, how much Pre-Heaven Jing would a cloned human receive

if scientists ever attempt to clone a human?

 

Victoria

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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