sperm cells

In the Future, You Won’t Need Two Parents to Make Babies

There are test-tube babies and three-parent babies, and both generate plenty of controversy. But as it stands, making a baby still requires an egg from a mother and sperm cells from a father. Scientists say that won’t always be the case, though, because someday it will likely be possible to make babies from skin cells alone.
Last year, scientists in Japan revealed that mice had been born of eggs made from a parent’s skin cells, and researchers believe the same technique can one day be used in humans. [1]

First Human Injected with Controversial Genetically Modified Genes

For the first time in history, a human has been injected with genes edited using the CRISPR-Cas9 method. [1]
The experiment took place on 28 October 2016, when a team of Chinese scientists, led by oncologist Lu You at Sichuan University in Chengdu, delivered the genetically modified (GM) cells into a patient with aggressive lung cancer as part of a clinical trial at the West China Hospital in Chengdu. [2]
To protect the patient’s privacy, the details of the trial have not been released; but Lu said the trial “went smoothly.”