Briefing Chat: The 30 year-legacy of a science icon – Dolly the sheep

**Benjamin Thompson** (0:04)
Hi, listeners, Benjamin here. It's the Friday show, The Briefing Chat, where we talk about a couple of stories we've read about in The Nature Briefing. And joining me this week is the one and only Flora Graham, Chief Editor of The Nature Briefing. Flora, thank you so much for stopping by.

**Flora Graham** (0:18)
It's always my pleasure to be here. Thank you so much, Ben, for having me.

**Benjamin Thompson** (0:21)
Not at all. Well, listen, why don't you go first this week with a story that you've been reading about and writing about as well, it has to be said. And it's a story about a birthday, an anniversary of sorts.

**Flora Graham** (0:29)
That's right. This is a really special birthday. And this is Dolly the Sheep. It was 30 years ago, 1996, on 5th of July, that Dolly was born. And of course, her claim to fame is to be the first mammal cloned from an adult cell.
Now, I was a bit surprised. I didn't see as much coverage and celebration of Dolly and the legacy of this breakthrough as I thought. But you know, maybe it's because I was on a place in my career journey at a certain time 30 years ago, and maybe the young kids don't know who Dolly is anymore. But for me, you know, when I think about that legendary nature cover with, like, accidentally another sheep's leg in the background, I just think that has to be just one of the key images of the modern biological and biotechnological age.

**Benjamin Thompson** (1:18)
Right. Because that paper, I think, came out in 1997 That was the first time I heard of it. I hadn't quite started at university yet, but I remember then this being a huge deal, right? This was going to be the start of a whole new avenue of science. It was a huge thing.

**Flora Graham** (1:33)
Yeah. I mean, I think people understandably thought, okay, this is going to be human cloning. Like reproductive cloning from adult cells means we're going to have human clones then. Now, it's kind of nice to look back now, 30 years later, and there's not a lot of human clones around. But it absolutely did prove to be a pivotal moment. I mean, cloning pets, for example, is now fairly commonplace among a certain demographic.
It's widely used in things like agricultural animals, race horses, things like that. So the risk of human clones still considered far, far too high, and that's not even to touch on the ethical concerns, which of course are enormous. But it seems the upshot is there was a huge, huge public response to this breakthrough. And long term, the effects have been broad, perhaps not as terrible as was feared. But then Nature this week did write an editorial about the Dolly breakthrough, and kind of used it as an example of, it could have been an opportunity for maybe coming up with a little bit more thought out, firmer framework for these kinds of moments where science really needs to be communicated to the public. And there are a lot of complex ethical and technical concepts to absorb. And perhaps it was a bit of a missed opportunity in that sense.

**Benjamin Thompson** (2:54)
And here we are then, say 30 years on. You've been reading what other folk have been writing across the board. I mean, what sort of things have other folks said about this anniversary?

**Flora Graham** (3:04)
I mean, I think that a lot of the kind of complex feelings of fear and apprehension have really faded away.
So reading the initial coverage, hearing interviews today with some of the major players. I mean, Ian Wilmot, who led the team, passed away in 2023, but there's still plenty of people who were around at the time. And they say the last thing they expected was to be on the cover of every newspaper. So it's quite a fun recollection in that way, people talking about just being totally unprepared and kind of delighted to be sharing their work with the world. And reading kind of from decades past, the 10th anniversary, 20th anniversary. Now 30 years on, it does feel like, all kind of the water is under the bridge, and maybe the worst fears haven't come to pass. So it does have more of a celebratory feel, this anniversary, I think, that it has in the past. And of course, Dolly, if you would like to see Dolly, she is at the National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh, nicely taxidermied on a spinning plinth.

**Benjamin Thompson** (4:03)
I have been to see Dolly in the National Museum of Scotland, and she is rather gently rotating on this plinth. And for me, it was important to go and see her, because I have been a scientist in a past life, and this was a huge scientific story. But as you say, for other people, that connection maybe isn't quite as strong, but it's still important that folk are aware that this happened, I suppose.