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Former employees of the Roslin Institute in Edinburgh, where Dolly the sheep was cloned, have petitioned the Queen to strip the scientist Sir Ian Wilmut of his knighthood on the grounds that he played only a minor role in the breakthrough.
Wilmut, who is now a professor at the University of Edinburgh, was knighted in the New Year's honours for services to science after he became globally recognised as the scientist who in 1996 created Dolly, the first mammal to be cloned from an adult animal.
However, Wilmut admitted last year that he played a lesser role in the breakthrough than his Roslin colleague, Professor Keith Campbell, who has since left the institute to become a research scientist at Nottingham University.
Four former employees of the Roslin, none of whom was directly involved in the Dolly research, have signed a petition calling on the Queen to withdraw Wilmut's knighthood on the grounds that he did not plan, design or carry out the experiment. "The undersigned believe that Professor Ian Wilmut may have conspired with others to obtain advantage and honour to which he is not entitled," the petition states.
- INDEPENDENT
