The New York Times carries an interesting story on a few unexpected twists with what many claim are the first commercially cloned pet dogs. MissyToo and Mira, both cloned from a dog named Missy, are far from exactly the same as their genetic parent. In fact, the owner gets more questions about their differences than their similarities. Apparently, the animal cloning discrepancy is a combination of nature vs. nurture and differences in mitochondrial DNA. Cloned animals have identical nuclear DNA, but that's as far as it goes.

The owner is a bit touchy on the differences, and for good reason:

He also has particular reason to be sensitive to questions that touch on the authenticity of the clones, given the history of his chief geneticist, Dr. Hwang Woo Suk of the Sooam Biotech Research Foundation in South Korea. Dr. Hwang is perhaps best known for fraudulently reporting in 2004 that a team he led had successfully cloned human embryos and stem cells. After the false claims were unearthed, he was fired by Seoul National University, where he did his research as a professor. But he is also widely acknowledged for having been involved in successfully cloning an Afghan hound in 2005.

Interesting read, not only for the anecdotal story, but as a preview of what's to come as animal cloning prices come down and more people make the leap to bring back a copy of lost loved ones of the four-legged variety.