An expert panel said Saturday that the technology developed in cloning China's first two skin cell-based calves equals that used by foreign countries or may even be more advanced.

The panel was formed by eight animal experts, biologists and China's chief panda-cloning experts from the Zoological Society of China and the Institute of Zoology under the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

DNA checks prove that the two calves are not genetically related to the cows that gave birth, but related to the cow providing the cells, the panel said.

The two calves were born about one and half months ago at the Laiyang Agricultural College in the eastern province of Shandong. They were both cloned by epidermal cells taken from the same beef cow fetus.

According to the panel, three new technologies developed during cloning are thought to be unique and promising: a new cell nucleus-removing method causing less harm to the oocyte; a new system for breeding re-organized embryos of higher developmental rate for blastula; and successfully using cells frozen below minus 35 Celsius degrees as nucleus donors.

The two calves, Kangkang born on November 3 and Shuangshuang three days later, calves are female and black and have been doing well.

Kangkang weighs 71 kilograms and Shuangshuang 71.5 kilograms, according to sources.

China's first cloned calf was born in mid-October in Shenzhen in south China's Guangdong Province, but died 80 minutes after birth.

(Xinhua News Agency December 23, 2001)