The research, which took more than a decade – Hope it will help understand why a woman’s pregnancy doesn’t go to term – Findings could be used to create synthetic human organs for transplant
Scientists from many countries (UK, USA, Italy, Israel) starting from murine pluripotent stem cellsthey created one “synthetic” fetus with brain, beating heart and the foundation for all the other organs of the body. This is a milestone in recreating the first stages of life in a living organism.
The researchers, led by Professor Magdalena Czerninka-Goetz of the University of Cambridge and the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), who made the relevant publication in the journal “Nature”, developed the embryo model without eggs and sperm, using stem cells that can gradually become specialized in almost all individual cells.
The scientists mimicked the natural processes in the lab, guiding three different types of stem cells to the point where they could now start interacting on their own. By inducing the expression of specific genes and creating the appropriate laboratory environment for such cellular interaction, stem cells began to “talk” to each other. Thus, they self-organized into structures that gradually passed through successive developmental stages until they acquired a brain and a beating heart.
The research, which spanned more than a decade and led to increasingly complex synthetic rodent embryos, is hoped to help scientists in the future understand why some human embryos fail and a woman’s pregnancy does not come to term. The findings can also be used to create synthetic human organs for transplantation.
“The mouse embryo model not only develops a brain, but also a beating heart and all the components that eventually make up the body. It’s incredible that we’ve come this far. This has been our dream for years and we finally achieved it”Czerninka-Goetz said.
For the human embryo to develop successfully, there must be a “dialogue” between the tissues that will become the embryo and the tissues that will connect it to the mother. During the first week after fertilization, three types of stem cells develop: one will eventually become the tissues of the body, while the other two support the development of the embryo. One of these two extraembryonic stem cell types will become the placenta that connects the fetus to the mother, providing it with oxygen and nutrients, while the other will become the lymphatic sac where the fetus grows.
Many pregnancies fail right at the stage where the above three types of stem cells begin to send chemical and other signals to each other in order for the embryo to develop properly. “So many pregnancies fail around that time, before most women even know they are pregnant,” said the lead researcher.
“This period of human life is so mysterious, so to be able to see in the lab what’s going on, to have access to these individual stem cells, to understand why so many pregnancies fail and how we might prevent that – all of this is something special,” emphasized Czerninka-Goetz.
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