October 7, 2004

Mule Clones on display On UI campus Oct. 9 and 16

MOSCOW –– The University of Idaho's three cloned mules will be on display before the Vandals' home football games the next two Saturdays. The mules will be in a corral across Perimeter Drive from the ASUI Kibbie Dome, and below the big gray barn.

This week's display coincides with Ag Days on the Moscow campus, which celebrates the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences. It also marks a year since the three mule foals were first shown to the public together.

The clones, Idaho Gem, Utah Pioneer and Idaho Star, will be on display from noon until an hour after the game both Oct. 9 and 16. The mules resulted from a collaborative scientific project by UI and Utah State University scientists.

UI student employees of the Northwest Equine Reproduction Laboratory will be available to talk about the project that produced Idaho Gem the first clone born in the horse family.

Idaho Gem was born May 4, 2003 , and attracted worldwide news coverage. He grew from 107 pounds at birth to 780 pounds in his first year and remains the largest of what are essentially identical triplets.

Utah Pioneer, born June 9, 2003 , was the lightest at birth at 78 pounds. He grew to 591 pounds in his first year but remains the lightest of the three.

The youngest, Idaho Star born July 27, 2003 , weighed 87 pounds at birth and grew to 733 pounds in his first year.

Earlier this year, the three mules again attracted international attention when the American Association for the Advancement of Science featured them during Family Science Day at its annual meeting in Seattle .

The association ranked the story of the science of equine cloning and the mules among the top 10 stories to emerge from the Seattle conference.

Dr. Gordon Woods and Dr. Dirk Vanderwall, the UI scientists on the project, continue to receive recognition for their feat.

Woods was named Idaho Veterinarian of the Year this summer and spoke at EuroScience 2004 in Stockholm about his experiences as a scientist making headlines.

Vanderwall won the Northern Idaho Veterinary Medical Association's George Oakshott Award. He spoke in Rio de Janeiro in August as the invited expert on equine cloning at an international conference.

In addition to producing three of the four equine clones worldwide, Woods said the project also opened a new avenue to studying cancer and age-onset diseases such as diabetes.

The key cloning breakthrough by the UI-Utah State scientists depended on new insights into basic cell biology that can improve understanding of how the diseases progress, Woods said.



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Contacts: Dr. Dirk Vanderwall, UI assistant professor of Animal and Veterinary Science, (208) 885-7414, dirkv@uidaho.edu ; or Bill Loftus, UI science writer, (208) 885-7694, bloftus@uidaho.edu.