HONG KONG, Jan. 20 (UPI) -- The first of 12 cloned calves to be born in the next 20 days died Sunday, officials confirmed, a setback in China's ambitious experiment that could someday clone rare Giant Pandas.
The cause of the calf's death is still unclear, Yu Zhongbo, the general manager of the Shandong Zhongda Animal Embryo Project Center told Xinhua news agency.
Yu said the calf named Weiwei was expected on or about January 27 but her surrogate mother began showing signs of labor on Friday and Weiwei was then delivered by caesarian section at 9:25 Friday night.
Yu told Xinhua that Weiwei's surrogate mother had been ill and had received transfusions over the past two months and that these may have affected the calf.
"Scientists here expected the cow cloning technology has a broad market potential, and it can also provide experience for exploring related technology to be used to clone rare species, such as the Giant Panda," said the agency
The Animal Embryo Project Center in Caoxian County has 12 pregnant cows in the scientific experiment and all are expected to give birth to cloned calves within the next 20 days. CAS scientists are monitoring the expectant mothers closely.
He said no one could assure a 100 percent success rate in cloning animals at the current level of cloning technology. First photographs showed the black and white female calf drinking from an infant's bottle shortly after her birth.
"Weiwei is China's first calf to be born following the embryo production and transplantation technology, which shows China's cloning technology has reached the world's most advanced level," Xinhua reported Chen Dayuan, a research fellow with the Animal Research Institution under the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) as saying shortly after her birth.
The experiment began, said Xinhua, when researchers removed cells from the ears of a bull and a high-yield dairy cow. Those were combined with the cells with the oocytes of different cattle. The cloned embryos were then implanted in the cows.
Cloned calves have been born in China in Guangdong and Laiyang provinces but the previous embryos were imported from abroad. Scientists said they expected the cow cloning technology to move into production in China in three to five years.
