May 21 (Bloomberg) -- Hwang Woo-Suk, the disgraced South Korean stem cell researcher, is getting into the dog breeding business.

In an auction starting June 18, dog owners can bid a minimum $100,000 for the right to have their dogs cloned, according to the Web site of BioArts International, the company offering the service. BioArts is offering the service in partnership with Hwang's Sooam Biotech Research Foundation in South Korea.

BioArts has rights to making copies of dogs, cats and endangered species using techniques developed and patented by the Roslin Institute, which cloned Dolly the sheep. Pet owners shouldn't expect ``reincarnation,'' said Arthur Caplan, chairman of the medical ethics department at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia.

``People believe they're going to get their pet back through cloning, but the new cloned dog won't know the old pet's tricks,'' he said in a telephone interview. ``It's a false promise to say you can get your pet back.''

Lou Hawthorne, chief executive of BioArts, started working on cloning his dog, Missy, in 1997. He now has three versions of his pet, which died in 2002.

``Most people who are interested in our service own mutts,'' Hawthorne said. ``That's a breed of one, and you'll never get that again.''

Seoul Investigation

In 2006, Seoul National University investigators confirmed media reports that Hwang had faked groundbreaking studies of human embryonic stem cells that had been published in the prestigious journals Science and Nature. The disclosure added to the furor over the ethics of research on human embryos, and Hwang lost his university position as well as government funding.

Though Hwang lied about his work on stem cells, he did tell the truth when he reported making the first cloned dog, named Snuppy, outside researchers confirmed.

Hwang and his associates set up a company called ``H Bion'' to commercialize cloned dogs, Sooam said in an e-mailed statement. The company, headed by Hwang, will work with BioArts International on the dog-cloning project, it said.

Besides dog cloning, H Bion will raise funds to support research on preserving endangered species, the statement said.

Hwang's team has cloned at least 26 dogs since he was fired from Seoul National University in 2006, the statement said. The cloned dogs are four golden retrievers, five beagles and 17 Tibet mastiffs, born between Jan. 24, 2007, and April 2 this year, according to the statement.

To contact the reporter on this story: Elizabeth Lopatto in New York at elopatto@bloomberg.net Bomi Lim in Seoul at blim30@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: May 21, 2008 11:19 EDT