Ian Wilmut

Sir Ian Wilmut, OBE (* July 7, 1944 in Hampton Lucey, Warwickshire ) is a British embryologist and director of the research team for medical cell biology at the University of Edinburgh. He had previously been considered the "father " of Dolly.

Life

Keith Campbell, Ian Wilmut has not, which was born on 5 July 1996 Dolly the sheep cloned during his research with the nucleus of a mature cell. In this experiment, we succeeded in cloning by nuclear transfer mammals. Before, this was in amphibians successfully performed ( Thomas J. King and Robert W. Briggs, 1952).

After this success he received in the years 1998, 1999 and 2002, three times the qualification " Doctor of Science" ( DSc ). 1999 Wilmut was awarded the Officer of the Order of the British Empire ( OBE) by Queen Elizabeth II and raised in 2008 as a Knight Bachelor, entitled Sir to the peerage. In addition, he received more than ten different awards for his research achievements, including in 2002, the Ernst Schering Prize. Him the Paul Ehrlich and Ludwig Darmstaedter Prize was awarded in 2005, 2008, the Shaw Prize ( with Campbell and Shin'ya Yamanaka ).

In April 2004, Wilmut filed with the competent authority, the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority ( HEFA ), an application for the cloning of human embryos. His goal is to clone human embryos for the purpose of stem cell research. This led to strong protests by opponents of human cloning. Wilmut basing its request that he would develop therapies against deadly nerve disease, thereby cloning from a medical point of view is justified. On 8 February 2005, he was granted by the HFEA license to clone human embryos. In 2005 he was elected a member of the Leopoldina.

Clone scandal

Ian Wilmut should have admitted before a committee of inquiry in Edinburgh that he was not the " father" of the world-famous cloned sheep. These fees honor his colleague Dr. Keith Campbell. The cell biologist and embryologist was then working in the clone project. He should thus have actually referred to as first author. But this privilege Wilmut had apparently secured - and reaped as well as the glory, the financial resources and prices.