Category: Human embryo research

Another team of researchers call for the 14-day limit on embryo experimentation to be scrapped

BioEdge

Michael Cook*

An international team of bioethicists and scientists has advised scrapping the 14-day limit that restricts how long researchers can study human embryos in a dish. Going beyond this policy limit could lead to potential health and fertility benefits, they contend in an article in Science.

This is not a novel suggestion. Scientists and bioethicists have been chafing at the bit for years to extend this widely-accepted limit. This time around, Insoo Hyun, of Case Western Reserve University, and colleagues urge policymakers and the International Society for Stem Cell Research (ISSCR) to consider “a cautious, stepwise approach” to scientific exploration beyond the 14-day limit.

ISSCR is expected to soon release updated guidelines for stem cell and embryo research. . . continue reading

After Months In A Dish, Lab-Grown Minibrains Start Making ‘Brain Waves’

National Public Radio

Jon Hamilton

By the time a fetus is 6 months old, it is producing electrical signals recognizable as brain waves.

And clusters of lab-grown human brain cells known as organoids seem to follow a similar schedule, researchers reported Thursday in the journal Cell Stem Cell.

“After these organoids are in that six-to-nine-months range, that’s when [the electrical patterns] start to look a lot like what you’d see with a preterm infant,” says Alysson Muotri, director of the stem cell program at the University of California, San Diego. . . [Full text]

Japanese scientist to use human-animal hybrids to create organs

BioEdge

Michael Cook

A Japanese stem cell scientist has obtained permission to create human-animal chimeras and transplant them into surrogate animals. Hiromitsu Nakauchi, a researcher at the University of Tokyo and at Stanford University, plans to insert induced pluripotent human cells into mouse embryos. His ultimate aim is to grow human organs in animals. . . [Full text]

Spanish and US scientists go to China to create human-monkey chimeras

BioEdge

Michael Cook

In a stunning example of evading ethical controversy by exporting it, Spanish and American researchers have created monkey-human chimeras in China. The hybrid embryos will be destroyed after they develop a central nervous system and will not be brought to term. . . [Full text]

Scientists Make Model Embryos From Stem Cells To Study Key Steps In Human Development

National Public Radio

Rob Stein

Scientists have created living entities that resemble very primitive human embryos, the most advanced example of these structures yet created in a lab.

The researchers hope these creations, made from human embryonic stem cells, will provide crucial new insights into human development and lead to new ways to treat infertility and prevent miscarriages, birth defects and many diseases. The researchers say this is the first timescientists have created living models of human embryos with three-dimensional structures.

The researchers reported their findings Monday in a paper published in the journal Nature Cell Biology.

But the research is stirring debate about how far scientists should go in creating living models of human embryos, sometimes called embryoids. . . [Full text]