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Tom Brady’s dog is a clone of a “beloved” family pet that died, the seven-time Super Bowl champion revealed on Tuesday.
The former New England Patriots quarterback is an investor with Colossal, a Texas-based biotechnology company that is attempting to bring back extinct species like the woolly mammoth.
“A few years ago, I worked with Colossal and leveraged their non-invasive cloning technology through a simple blood draw of our family’s elderly dog before she passed,” Brady said in a statement. “In a few short months, Colossal gave my family a second chance with a clone of our beloved dog.”
People magazine reports that his dog Junie is a clone of his late pit bull mix Lua that died in December 2023. Brady’s ex-wife Gisele Bundchen, in an Instagram post at the time, remembered Lua as “our guardian angel,” writing that “she will forever live in our hearts.”
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Colossal said earlier this year that it successfully birthed three dire wolves, which have been extinct for more than 12,500 years. The company said it used DNA from a 13,000-year-old tooth and a 72,000-year-old skull to analyze the genome of the species, and then used CRISPR gene-editing technology to genetically modify cells from a living gray wolf.
Brady’s revelation came as Colossal announced it acquired Viagen, a company that it says holds the rights to technology that helped clone Dolly the sheep. Among the other celebrity investors in the company are “Lord Of The Rings” director Peter Jackson and Paris Hilton.
“I am excited how Colossal and Viagen’s tech together can help both families losing their beloved pets while helping to save endangered species,” Brady said.
