cloned child and the mother.Animal studies on reproductivecloning show a high incidence offetal disorders and spontaneousabortions, and malformation anddeath among newborns. There isno reason to suppose that theoutcome would be different inhumans,” says May.

The birth of Dolly the sheep in1996, cloned from a cell from themammary gland of anothersheep, raised hopes of growingheart or nervous tissue to treatcoronary or neurodegenerativediseases.

But the 16,000 scientistsrepresented by 63 academiesbelieve that nations should makeup their own minds on whetherresearch should be allowed onembryo-derived stem cells.“Opinions on the ethics oftherapeutic cloning in differentcountries are divided. It would bea tragedy if we alloweddisagreements on therapeuticcloning to jeopardize aconvention that could ensure thathuman reproductive cloning isoutlawed across the globe andprotect vulnerable people fromunscrupulous individuals,” saysMay. “A UN convention will putpressure on countries to passlegislation banning this unsafeand unethical practice. Policy ontherapeutic cloning should beexcluded from the UN conventionand determined at national level.”

Richard Gardner, chair of theRoyal Society’s recent studiesinto stem cell research said thatthe society urged “all othernations, particularly the UnitedStates, to introduce and supportappropriate regulations thatwould create a worldwidemoratorium on humanreproductive cloning, regardlessof whether it is funded publicly orprivately.”

In the US, despite somebreakthroughs, research onhuman-derived stem cells hasbeen handicapped by thePresident’s decision two yearsago to allow work only on stemcell lines developed earlier.Scientists have testified beforeCongress that research is still allbut paralysed in this areabecause of the government’sdecision.

Current Biology Vol 13 No 20R786

Fungi represent one of the mostabundant but least knowngroups of organisms on theplanet. The number of speciescan be more than an order ofmagnitude greater than otherconspicuous multi-celledorganisms. Britain, with 50 or sospecies of butterfly and 400species of birds is estimated tobe home to around 12,000species of fungi. The range ofspecies and their environmentaland other significance is onlyslowly being fully realised.

One of the problems is thatmany species lack a commonname so that their presence orabsence in particular situationsgoes unnoticed. In manycountries, edible species carrycommon names and are activelysought by collectors. Theiractivities ensure that speciesare monitored and any changesin abundance do not gounobserved.

But Britain has no tradition ofcollecting fungi beyond a singlefield mushroom species, in spiteof the abundance of otheredible species.The lack of aname is not confined to rare,obscure or microscopic fungi;many groups with large,colourful fruiting bodies have noname other than the Linnaean

Latin one given to them by keenmycologists over the years.

But a new project, backed bythe British Mycological Society,has, over several years, comeup with a list of English namesfor more than 1,000 species ofthe most commonly recordedfungi. The society first tackledthe issue in the 1960s with theproduction of a list of 200names for fungi, over half ofwhich are still in use today. Thenew list includes both edibleand poisonous species, as wellas those of conservationconcern.

The hope is that the newnames will help people who findthe Latin names off-putting tospot fungi. But in a nod toLinnaeus, each genus has asuggested common secondEnglish name so that, forexample, all the Russula speciesare called Xxx Brittlegill.Exceptions are those specieswhere a common name is nowin common use. The societyhopes the new common nameswill help raise awareness of thisimportant group of organisms.And it surely has had funintroducing words such as‘disco’, ‘caterpillarclub’,‘jellybaby’ and ‘woodwax’ intothe fungal vocabulary.

Naming game: Fruiting bodies of the fungus Russula fellea, now known as theGeranium Brittlegill. (Photograph: Oxford Scientific Films.)

Fungal familiarities