Is dolly the sheep dead or alive?

Answer 1

Dolly the sheep died on February 15 2003 from Ovine Pulmonary Adenocarcinoma. OPA is a fairly common disease on sheep farms but usually affects older sheeps. Other sheep on the farm where Dolly lived were also treated for the same lung ailment and this is very common in sheep that are kept indoors.

So to understand how Dolly passed away at such a young age, we need to understand the function of these tiny sacrificial materials found at the end of the DNA strand known as the telomeres. Telomeres are basically little pieces of the ends on every DNA strand that basically have no codes on them but as the cells go through mitosis (which is the division of one parent cell into two daughters), while the DNA and all of the genes on it are duplicated equally and have 100% the same amount of genes as the original parent, the telomeres do NOT restore to their original amount. So with every mitosis, the number of telomeres in each new cell is less than the amount found in the original parent cell. In general, telomeres are one of the major contributors of aging and the lesser you have, the older you'll look!

In normal birth between, every individual regardless of species have a set amount of telomeres which as a result determines that individual's life span and how long they will live. Once an organism runs low on telomeres, they start to age get elder-looking features as well as lose some genes at the ends of each strand. The reason is because telomeres NEVER turn back on once the child is born so they remain inactive throughout the organism's whole life while their DNA on the other hand is always active.

In Dolly's case, the young ewe was cloned from an ADULT which means that her DNA was directly extracted from an adult sheep! That adult that she was cloned from already had HALF the telomeres (in this case, only 7 years left of her life span). Since Dolly was directly copied off from an adult with half the telomeres of a regular baby sheep, this means that she was born with only half the life span of a normal sheep and this is what caused her to apparently age rapidly and pass away at what was supposedly a young age for a sheep. It's because she was already an old lady sheep at that age with very little telomeres left as a result of cloning from an adult sheep with only half the telomeres!

Answer 2

Dolly the sheep was euthanized on February 14, 2003, due to a progressive lung disease and severe Arthritis. Her lung condition was a common cancer in sheep called Jaagsiekte.

Answer 3

Dolly the sheep was cloned from an adult sheep. Meaning the telomere present on the DNA Dolly was cloned from had already been partially eroded. Leading to a short lifetime for dolly.

Answer 4

Dolly the sheep died on Valentine's Day because she had a severe longue disease. Idk what it was called though...

Answer 5

She died at the age of 6