# Is it possible to spawn human progeny alone?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-spawn-human-progeny-alone/366566
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [July 29, 2006, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-spawn-human-progeny-alone/366566 "2006-07-29T19:11:48Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@The\_Controvert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Controvert)
#### Post date: [July 29, 2006, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-spawn-human-progeny-alone/366566/1 "2006-07-29T19:11:48Z")
Suppose I wanted to pass my genes to offspring, but didn’t want to do it via traditional reproduction. Is it possible, with today’s technology, to create a child using solely my own genetic material? Does it matter if I am male or female? (Assume a healthy adult donor)
Would the offspring be legitimately mine? And what kind of dollar pricetag would it take to undertake such an enterprise successfully?
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### Author:  [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)
#### Post date: [July 29, 2006, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-spawn-human-progeny-alone/366566/2 "2006-07-29T19:22:17Z")
This is called _Human Cloning_. It is _illegal in the United States and elsewhere._
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### Author:  [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)
#### Post date: [July 29, 2006, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-spawn-human-progeny-alone/366566/3 "2006-07-29T20:16:19Z")
The question was, _“Is it **possible**?”_, not _“Is it **legal**?”_. I am uncertain whether the techology exists, as yet, to bring a human cloning to fruition.
As to whether the resulting child would legitimately be your offspring, it might be more accurate to call it your sibling, and your parents’ offspring.
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### Author:  [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)
#### Post date: [July 29, 2006, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-spawn-human-progeny-alone/366566/4 "2006-07-29T20:23:44Z")
> [@Bosda Di'Chi of Tricor](#):
>
> This is called _Human Cloning_. It is _illegal in the United States and elsewhere._
Cite?
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### Author:  [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)
#### Post date: [July 29, 2006, 8:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-spawn-human-progeny-alone/366566/5 "2006-07-29T20:24:52Z")
With current cloning technologies it might be possible, but current cloning techniques require an egg, so technically for it to be from you alone, I would say it could only work currently for a female.
The chance of success would appear to still be very low but cloning is making significant progress since Dolly the Sheep.
The cost would be very high and have to be done outside of the US. As there is no way to know how many tries it would take and there has been no reported successes at cloning humans, guessing at the cost would be futile.
The offspring could well be considered yours, especially if you were female and acted as the host mother to the successful fertile ovum.
Jim
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### Author:  [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)
#### Post date: [July 29, 2006, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-spawn-human-progeny-alone/366566/6 "2006-07-29T20:28:48Z")
The [Raëlians](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ra%C3%ABlism) claimed to have cloned a human back in 2002. Aliens helped them.
Hwang Woo-Suk of Seoul National University claimed to have cloned human embryos in 2004. He got busted for fraud.
As far as I know, no one’s managed to clone a human yet. Maybe the folks in black helicopters have done so, but if so, they aren’t talking.
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### Author:  [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)
#### Post date: [July 29, 2006, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-spawn-human-progeny-alone/366566/7 "2006-07-29T20:33:19Z")
Another interesting possibility: I read somewhere that they made stem cells turn into sperm cells. This raises the possibility of a woman’s adult stem cells being turned into sperm, and used to fertilize her own egg. Don’t recall if the sperm was made from embryonic or adult stem cells, and I’m pretty sure it was done with rats, so it may not be possible with humans at all, non-embryonic or not.
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### Author:  [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)
#### Post date: [July 29, 2006, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-spawn-human-progeny-alone/366566/8 "2006-07-29T20:36:52Z")
[Of some possible interest.](http://www.ornl.gov/sci/techresources/Human_Genome/elsi/cloning.shtml#animalsQ)
> [@](#):
>
> \*\*What animals have been cloned? \*\* Scientists have been cloning animals for many years. In 1952, the first animal, a tadpole, was cloned. Before the creation of Dolly, the first mammal cloned from the cell of an adult animal, clones were created from embryonic cells. Since Dolly, researchers have cloned a number of large and small animals including sheep, goats, cows, mice, pigs, cats, rabbits, and a gaur. See Cloned Animals below. All these clones were created using nuclear transfer technology.
>
> Hundreds of cloned animals exist today, but the number of different species is limited. Attempts at cloning certain species such as monkeys, chickens, horses, and dogs, have been unsuccessful. Some species may be more resistant to somatic cell nuclear transfer than others. The process of stripping the nucleus from an egg cell and replacing it with the nucleus of a donor cell is a traumatic one, and improvements in cloning technologies may be needed before many species can be cloned successfully.
[From lower in the page:](http://www.ornl.gov/sci/techresources/Human_Genome/elsi/cloning.shtml#humans)
> [@](#):
>
> Due to the inefficiency of animal cloning (only about 1 or 2 viable offspring for every 100 experiments) and the lack of understanding about reproductive cloning, many scientists and physicians strongly believe that it would be unethical to attempt to clone humans.
Jim
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### Author:  [@MikeS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MikeS)
#### Post date: [July 29, 2006, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-spawn-human-progeny-alone/366566/9 "2006-07-29T20:56:38Z")
> [@Guinastasia](#):
>
> Cite?
[Here you go.](http://www.ncsl.org/programs/health/Genetics/rt-shcl.htm) Specifically, you want the states which outlaw “reproductive cloning.”
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### Author:  [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)
#### Post date: [July 29, 2006, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-spawn-human-progeny-alone/366566/10 "2006-07-29T22:36:10Z")
> [@MikeS](#):
>
> [Here you go.](http://www.ncsl.org/programs/health/Genetics/rt-shcl.htm) Specifically, you want the states which outlaw “reproductive cloning.”
Huh. I thought the only laws were against government funding for it. Okay, thanks.
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### Author:  [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)
#### Post date: [July 30, 2006, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-spawn-human-progeny-alone/366566/11 "2006-07-30T21:03:01Z")
Have they worked out the problem with the shortened telomeres yet? As I understand it, Dolly died of something resembling old age when she should have still been very young, since her chromosones were already age-damaged.
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### Author:  [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)
#### Post date: [July 30, 2006, 9:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-spawn-human-progeny-alone/366566/12 "2006-07-30T21:05:55Z")
> [@Guinastasia](#):
>
> Cite?
Which part?
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### Author:  [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)
#### Post date: [July 30, 2006, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-spawn-human-progeny-alone/366566/13 "2006-07-30T21:07:48Z")
> [@Chronos](#):
>
> Have they worked out the problem with the shortened telomeres yet? As I understand it, Dolly died of something resembling old age when she should have still been very young, since her chromosones were already age-damaged.
I’ve seen claims they have for Cats, I think the article was about 3 months back in the New Scientist. I do not subscribe, so I will not be able to find it. I also do not remember the scientific detail, so possible felines do not suffer from “shortened telomeres”.
Could you possibly sum up what “shortened telomeres” are? You are over my head. \*
Jim
- This doesn’t take much, anything beyond Scientific America levels of discourse.
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### Author:  [@Waenara](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Waenara)
#### Post date: [July 30, 2006, 10:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-spawn-human-progeny-alone/366566/14 "2006-07-30T22:26:10Z")
Is [Parthenogenesis](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parthenogenesis) a possibility?
It creates offspring from a single parent, but isn’t cloning per se:
> [@](#):
>
> Parthenogenesis has nothing to do with artificial animal cloning, though the process is a form of natural cloning. In April 2004, scientists at Tokyo University of Agriculture used parthenogenesis to successfully create fatherless mice.
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### Author:  [@Arien](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arien)
#### Post date: [July 30, 2006, 10:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-spawn-human-progeny-alone/366566/15 "2006-07-30T22:43:26Z")
> [@What Exit?](#):
>
> I’ve seen claims they have for Cats, I think the article was about 3 months back in the New Scientist. I do not subscribe, so I will not be able to find it. I also do not remember the scientific detail, so possible felines do not suffer from “shortened telomeres”.
> Could you possibly sum up what “shortened telomeres” are? You are over my head. \*
>
> Jim
>
> - This doesn’t take much, anything beyond Scientific America levels of discourse.
Aha, something I finally know! Telomeres are short repeated sequences of DNA at the end of your chromosomes. Due to the nature of the DNA replication process, your body is unable to copy the very ends of your DNA, but since telomeres don’t code for anything, it’s ok to lose them. Eventually you will run out of telomere sequences and the cell will stop dividing. Shortening of the telomeres has a role in aging and in cancer, but I am not a geneticist and can’t really tell you what. 🙂
Here’s a link to the wikipedia entry on [telomeres](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telomere), if I didn’t explain it well.
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### Author:  [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)
#### Post date: [July 30, 2006, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-spawn-human-progeny-alone/366566/16 "2006-07-30T22:52:39Z")
> [@Arien](#):
>
> Aha, something I finally know! Telomeres are short repeated sequences of DNA at the end of your chromosomes. Due to the nature of the DNA replication process, your body is unable to copy the very ends of your DNA, but since telomeres don’t code for anything, it’s ok to lose them. Eventually you will run out of telomere sequences and the cell will stop dividing. Shortening of the telomeres has a role in aging and in cancer, but I am not a geneticist and can’t really tell you what. 🙂
>
> Here’s a link to the wikipedia entry on [telomeres](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telomere), if I didn’t explain it well.
Great Nutshell, I had already checked the Wiki article after I posted, but your post sums it up very nicely in proper layman terms.
Thank you,
Jim
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### Author:  [@JR\_Brown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JR_Brown)
#### Post date: [August 1, 2006, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-spawn-human-progeny-alone/366566/17 "2006-08-01T21:00:36Z")
> [@Revtim](#):
>
> Another interesting possibility: I read somewhere that they made stem cells turn into sperm cells. This raises the possibility of a woman’s adult stem cells being turned into sperm, and used to fertilize her own egg. Don’t recall if the sperm was made from embryonic or adult stem cells, and I’m pretty sure it was done with rats, so it may not be possible with humans at all, non-embryonic or not.
Mice. Using embryonic stem cells.
[ul]
[li]Nayernia K, Nolte J, Michelmann HW, et al. 2006. In vitro-differentiated embryonic stem cells give rise to male gametes that can generate offspring mice. Developmental Cell, Jul; 11(1):125-32.[/li][/ul]
Unfortunately, the Y chromosome contains several genes necessary for sperm development, so you need to start with male stem cells. On the other hand, it is possible (at least with mice) to get male cells to produce eggs, so you could get a uniparental non-clone by taking a male cell, doing nuclear transfer to produce cloned ES cells, differentiating them to become eggs (which so far has not been done convincingly in any species) and fertilizing them with the donor’s sperm. You’d still need a female to donate the eggs for the nuclear transfer, and a host mother, but all of the genetic material would come from the man (except for [mitochondria](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitochondria)).
And the major problem with cloning seems to be [imprinting](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imprinting_%28genetics%29) rather than telomeres.
JRB
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### Author:  [@yelimS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yelimS)
#### Post date: [August 1, 2006, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-spawn-human-progeny-alone/366566/18 "2006-08-01T21:18:50Z")
Damn, I wrote a neat post about all cells, not only sex cells, mutating, and then I remembered twins and realized that mutations after conception must even themselves out or something.
But could you, against all respectable odds, get a white kid with a black arm, for example?
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### Author:  [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)
#### Post date: [August 2, 2006, 4:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-spawn-human-progeny-alone/366566/19 "2006-08-02T04:30:52Z")
> [@](#):
>
> But could you, against all respectable odds, get a white kid with a black arm, for example?
At a guess, that could happen with a chimera, given appropriate fathers. But IANAB, nor a MS.
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### Author:  [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)
#### Post date: [August 2, 2006, 6:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-spawn-human-progeny-alone/366566/20 "2006-08-02T06:10:54Z")
Am I right that if a human were to develop from the genetic code created by joining together the two half-codes contained in two randomly picked specimens of my sperm, then about 3/4 of that offspring’s genes would have two identical alleles?
My reasoning is:
I have either, say, DD, Dd, dD, or dd, each with the same probability
If I have DD, then my offspring will have DD.
If I have dd, then my offspring will have dd.
If I have Dd, then my offspring could have DD, Dd, dD, or dd
Same if I have dD.
Count up all the possible DDs, and you get 6/16. Count up the dds, and you get 6/16. Meaning 12/16, meaning 3/4.
This is different (right?) than the normal course of events, where the presence of a second contributor of DNA changes the probability so that just 1/2 of the genes consist of the same allele twice over.
-FrL-
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