Texas A&M University announced Wednesday that it had successfully cloned a horse, making the school the first to clone six different species.
Researchers at A&M's College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences used adult horse skin cells biopsied from a genetic donor to clone the foal, which was born on March 13. The privately owned foal has been named Paris Texas.
The university partnered with a French company that is dedicated to preserving the genes of exceptional horses.
In December 2003, the school announced it had cloned a white-tailed deer — a fawn named "Dewey." Dewey is believed to be the first successfully cloned deer, said officials at A&M, which has also cloned cattle, goats, pigs and a cat.
The first cloned cat was born at the school on Dec. 22, 2001. Since then the university has cloned several litters of pigs, a Boer goat, a disease-resistant Angus bull, and the first Brahma bull.
