Scientists grow human eggs to full maturity in a lab

By Kate and Kelland

 

A series of magnified images show human eggs in development stages. Prof. Evelyn Telfer and Dr. Marie McLaughlin/University of Edinburgh/Handout via REUTERS

 

LONDON, Feb 9 - Scientists have succeeded for the first time in growing human eggs in a laboratory from the earliest stages in ovarian tissue all the way to full maturity - a scientific step that had previously been taken in mice.

 

Publishing their result in the journal Molecular Human Reproduction on Friday, scientists from Britain and the United States said it could one day help in developing regenerative medicine therapies and new infertility treatments.

 

In previous studies, scientists had developed mouse eggs in a laboratory to the stage where they produced live offspring, and had also matured human eggs from a relatively late stage of development.

 

This latest work, by scientists at two research hospitals in Edinburgh and the Center for Human Reproduction in New York, is the first time human eggs have been developed outside the human body from their earliest stage to full maturity.

 

"Being able to fully develop human eggs in the lab could widen the scope of available fertility treatments. We are now working on optimising the conditions that support egg development in this way and studying how healthy they are," said Evelyn Telfer, who co-led the work.

 

Independent experts not directly involved in this work praised it as important, but also cautioned that there is much more to do before lab-grown human eggs could be safely be made ready for fertilisation with sperm.

 

"This early data suggests this may well be feasible in the future," said Ali Abbara, a senior clinical lecturer in Endocrinology at Imperial College London.

 

"(But) the technology remains at an early stage, and much more work is needed to make sure that the technique is safe and optimised before we ascertain whether these eggs remain normal during the process, and can be fertilised to form embryos that could lead to healthy babies."

 

Darren Griffin, a genetics professor at Kent University in the UK, said the work was "an impressive technical achievement".

 

If success and safety rates were improved, he said, it could in future help cancer patients wishing to preserve their fertility while undergoing chemotherapy treatment, improve fertility treatments, and deepen scientific understanding of the biology of the earliest stages of human life.

 

(Editing by Mark Heinrich)

 

-- © Copyright Reuters 2018-02-09

I like mine srambled

Oh my, rich women will be ecstatic at this news. Not only will they no longer have to have caesareans to avoid all that nasty pain, they'll be able to avoid all those other inconveniences of childbearing like stretch marks, Cooper's droop and morning sickness.

Edited February 9, 20188 yr by thaibeachlovers

Full maturity? Where's the baby pics?.... just what we need, more people on the planet.

Just like the movie "the Island" how long until they start farming people for their organs?

 all the way to full maturity ........hermaphrodite are they? 

I wish someone loved me as much as humanity loves itself.

Stop this now. I'm all for progress, but at a human rate, not at technology-enabled rate, which is always faster than its deleterious consequences can be managed. Unnatural fertility is another step on the road to making life meaningless.

What's the rush? Maybe the plan is really to burn the earth to a cinder within a few years in one mad glorious flash, but nobody told me.

3 hours ago, Emster23 said:

Full maturity? Where's the baby pics?.... just what we need, more people on the planet.

Nope, we need cheap transplants for rich people and those who want to get richer. 

I don't even like the idea of test-tube babies, so you can guess what my attitude is about this human egg news.

 

When human cloning is perfected, guess who will be first in line to clone themselves, .....yup very rich people, and those types thinking they're God-like:  Saddam Hussein, Chairman Mao, NK's Kim, El Chapo, Trump, .....you get the (ugly) picture.

 

Troll post removed.  

Great. No more of that ugly, messy, nasty and completely bothersome business of sexual intercourse.

Finally, we can have children without women, AND get 100% custody.

54 minutes ago, MaeJoMTB said:

Finally, we can have children without women, AND get 100% custody.

Assuming you want children.

4 hours ago, MaeJoMTB said:

Finally, we can have children without women, AND get 100% custody.

Dream on. Women will never allow men to escape the necessity to give them lots of money.

They will come up with some excuse eg as men are all sexual abusers, they can't be trusted to bring up a child without having a woman around to keep them in line.

Edited February 10, 20188 yr by thaibeachlovers

15 hours ago, car720 said:

and husbands.

As that is self evident, I didn't consider it worth including.

On ‎2‎/‎8‎/‎2018 at 10:41 PM, ALLSEEINGEYE said:

I like mine srambled

Sunny side up for me