Scientists use stem cells to create models of pre-embryos
ABC News
Scientists are using human stem cells to create a structure that mimics a pre-embryo and can serve as a research alternative to a real one
Scientists are using human stem cells to create a structure that mimics a pre-embryo and can serve as a research alternative to a real one.
They say these “blastoids” provide an efficient, ethical way to study human development and pursue biomedical discoveries in fertility and contraception.
The latest effort was detailed Thursday in the journal Nature. The structures aren’t embryos, but scientists nevertheless didn't let them grow past two weeks in deference to longstanding ethical guidelines.
A blastoid is a model for a blastocyst, a ball of cells that form within a week of fertilization and are about the width of a hair. Nicolas Rivron, a researcher at the Austrian Academy of Sciences and one of the authors of the Nature paper, said the models are “a fantastic alternative" to human embryos for research, partly because donated embryos are hard to obtain and manipulate in the lab.
