ohmidog!

Five German shepherds cloned from the cells of an award-winning search and rescue dog were unveiled today at a press conference in Beverly Hills.

With a poster of his original police dog, Trakr, behind him, cop-turned-actor James Symington choked up in his remarks as he stood behind a podium adorned with an American and a Korean flag.

The retired Halifax, Nova Scotia, police officer took possession of the five dogs this weekend — his prize for winning the “Golden Clone Giveaway,” an essay contest sponsored by BioArts International, a California biotech company that is cloning dogs in conjunction with a Korean scientist.

Symington said that if the puppies have the same abilities as Trakr — and he’s seen some signs they might — he intends to put them to work as search and rescue dogs.

Symington and Trakr took part in the rescue operation after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City. Symington says Trakr located the last survivor pulled from the rubble of Ground Zero.

Originally, Symington was to receive a single clone of the dog.

“We were going to do one, maybe two,” said BioArts CEO Lou Hawthorne. “But we decided collectively that the world would be a better place with more Trakrs.”

Hawthorne says Symington hopes to train all five dogs in search and rescue and work with them as a team, responding to crisis areas around the world.

Trakr died in April at the age of 16.

BioArts auctioned off five other dog clonings last summer to bidders in an online auction. Hawthorne said two of those cloned dogs have been delivered, and that a third will be delivered soon. The fourth has been born, and the fifth cloning has resulted in a pregnancy.

The cloning was done at  the Sooam Biotech Research Foundation in South Korea and was led by Dr. Hwang Woo-Suk, who produced the world’s first canine clone in 2005.  The first Takr clone was born on Dec. 8 of  last year and the last arrived April 4.