Yay for biology, Part II

I was doing the washing up on the weekend and overheard something on the tv about 'peeling sheep', which, unsurprisingly, caught my attention. The show was Landline and the product: 'Bioclip', which has been under development for many years and is just becoming commercially viable. Over thousands of years of domestication, the tendency for sheep to shed their wool has been bred out of most breeds. The bioclip process involves injecting a naturally occurring protein, covering the sheep in a net 'boob tube', and hey presto, a couple of months later, the wool can be peeled off instead of shearing. It's better for the sheep (no cuts from shearing) and better for the wool (more even length and no contaminating bits of skin. I think this is pretty nifty.