Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer

[Emily_38]

I'm doing a research project on SCNT and the genetic information in the nucleus from the somatic cell is transferred to the clone, but the the clone also inherits the mitochondrial DNA from the egg cell the somatic cell nucleus is inserted into. So the clone is not 100% genetically identical to the original subject. I was just wondering if there's any reason why we can't just take out the mitochondrial DNA from the egg cell and replace it with the mtDNA from the somatic cell, so the clone would be 100% identical.

[mith]

Well to give you some perspective, until recently researchers needed to use dye and UV lights to visualize the nuclear DNA and then extract it. Now, the mitochondria are much smaller and more numerous. Think how hard it would be to replace those.