Dolly's creators to end pig cloning project

By Clive Cookson and David Firn, The Financial Times
Published: August 14 2000 20:11GMT | Last Updated: August 14 2000 20:28GMT

The Scottish scientists who created Dolly the sheep are winding down a project to clone pigs for human organ transplants.

But their withdrawal leaves half a dozen companies committed to xenotransplant research - genetically engineering animals to alleviate the global shortage of human organ donors.

The Roslin Institute in Edinburgh said yesterday that funding for the project - provided by Geron, a Californian biotechnology company - would be "refocused" on other areas for commercial, rather than safety, reasons.

It strongly denied weekend press reports that it was giving up because of fears that xenotransplants could spread viral diseases from pigs to people.

The reports knocked 8½ per cent off the share price of PPL Therapeutics, a separate Roslin spin-off company that has its own xenotransplant programme. The shares closed 14p down at 151p.

PPL yesterday reaffirmed its commitment to the research, which has already produced five cloned piglets. Ron James, managing director, said the market's reaction was irrational.

There were no developments to change the company's view that xenotransplantation could be "a safe and effective source of organs for transplantation", he said. More research would be necessary "to allay all fears" about new pig viruses infecting people via xenotransplants, and PPL did not expect clinical trials to start for at least four years.

Grahame Bulfield, director of the Roslin Institute, said: "While xenotransplantation has raised a number of well-publicised issues such as possible infection with pig viruses, these were not the basis for the decision to refocus funding."

Analysts estimate that the market for pig organs could be worth $6bn (£4bn) a year if the scientific obstacles - preventing rejection and infection - can be overcome.

Besides PPL, a number of companies have active xenotransplantation research programmes. They include Imutran, a British subsidiary of the Swiss Novartis group, and several US companies: Nextran, owned by Baxter International; Infigen; Alexion; DNX Biotherapeutics; BioTransplant; and Genzyme.

The view of the competing xenotransplantation companies yesterday was that Roslin and Geron were pulling out because they realised they were falling behind in a crowded field.

Eventually, human stem cell research may provide an alternative to pigs for transplantation, by allowing scientists to grow new organs from the recipient's own cloned cells.

Tomorrow the government is expected to announce a relaxation in British law that would allow such research to proceed.