Take some skin cells from a beagle, insert fluorescent genes into them, throw that little combo into some eggs and then implant them into a surrogate…and you’ve got yourself a glowing dog.

Scientists in South Korea say they’ve used this technique to “engineer” four beagles that glow red under ultraviolet light (in fact, their nails and abdomens look red even to the naked eye).

Researchers say this achievement is significant because they were able to successfully plant genes (which, in this case, were the flourescent genes) into dogs.

Why make dogs glow? Researchers hope to show that it is possible to insert trait-specific genes which they hope would lead to the ultimate goal of finding new treatments for genetic diseases in humans.

This marks the first time anyone has successfully cloned dogs with modified genes–scientists in Japan, Europe and the U.S. have previously succeeded in creating fluorescent mice and pigs.

Source: The Associated Press