South Korean scientist and claims of cloning embryos

Last time I mentioned that I was going to talk about more credible claims of reproductive cloning. And I really thought I was on to something. I had read an initial report from the BBC back in 2004, about the claims of a South Korean Scientist, Dr Hwang Woo-Suk, who had published work in the well respected journal, Science, reporting to have cloned 30 embryos (Source: BBC News). He had also published another work, also in Science, a year later, and at the time these results were respected by the scientific community. The results released were all peer reviewed by Science.  Hwang had also gained credibility by cloning his dog, "Snuppy". Hwang was celebrated as a hero in Korea, and was given millions of dollars by the Korean government in reward and for further research (Source: Asian Scientist).

Source: Asian Scientist

Sounds interesting, but it was all too good to be true. Soon after, it was found that Hwang's research was fabricated. Egg donors for the research were women who worked in the laboratory, and there was many more eggs used in the process than first indicated (Source: BBC News) Hwang was accused of fraud, embezzlement and ethics violation and was convicted of embezzlement in 2009 (Source: Nature Volume 461, 2009)

But the story gets better.  In 2011, Hwang was rescued from Lybia in the wake of the civil war there and was linked to exiled Lybian leader Muammar Gaddafi. It is thought that Hwang was being funded to set up a stem cell clinic in Lybia (Source: Asian Scientist)

The story has similar elements to other cloning claims I have explored. The only exceptions are:

• Hwang's work was published by a leading, peer reviewed journal. Twice.
• Hwang wasn't lying about the cloning of his dog, Snuppy. It was confirmed that Snuppy was a clone.

From my perspective, the motivation for Hwang to do what he did is obvious. He gained recognition and large amounts of money for his works. There are high stakes involved in producing results proving reproductive cloning at the early embryo stage. Maybe this is why the weird, wonderful and strange have been attracted to claiming they can clone a human.