Baby born from embryo frozen for 30 years

A baby has been born in the USA from an embryo frozen in 1994, the longest known gap between embryo freezing and live birth.

The embryo was donated by Linda Archerd, now 62. Archerd originally underwent IVF with her then-husband in the early 1990s after struggling to conceive, and the cycle produced four embryos. One was transferred, and their daughter was born in 1994. Archerd hoped to use the remaining three frozen embryos in future, but considered her options when she started going through menopause. Deciding she was not comfortable discarding the embryos, or donating them anonymously, she signed up to a Christian 'embryo adoption' charity. Lindsey and Tim Pierce 'adopted' the embryos and their son, Thaddeus Daniel Pierce, was born on 26 July 2025.

'We didn't go into it thinking we would break any records,' Lindsey Pierce told MIT Technology Review. 'We just wanted to have a baby.'

In the USA, embryo donation is sometimes called 'embryo adoption', a term less commonly used in the UK. The process is usually overseen by agencies that facilitate donation in storage by 'matching' embryos with couples for 'adoption'.

However, many agencies will not accept embryos stored for such a long period, as they are often frozen using older techniques, and are thought to be less likely to survive thawing and result in a live birth. Archerd eventually found an agency willing to accept the embryos if she was able to provide original medical and lab records from the time they were created.

Archerd specified that she preferred the embryos go to a couple of similar background. She told the MIT Technology Review: 'I didn’t want them to go out of the country... And being Christian is very important to me, because I am.'

The embryos were 'matched' to the Pierces, a Christian couple from Ohio in their mid-30s who had been trying to conceive for seven years. The couple sent photos of their newborn to Archerd, who noted the striking resemblance to her own daughter, now 30 years old, with a 10-year-old daughter of her own.

The embryo transfer was performed at Rejoice Fertility, Tennessee, run by reproductive endocrinologist Dr John Gordon. The clinic aims to reduce the number of stored embryos and tries to accept embryos of all ages and quality, including those which can be challenging to thaw.

Dr Gordon told the MIT Technology Review that his clinic was guided by Christian principles, including that: 'every embryo deserves a chance at life'.

The same clinic held the previous record, when twins were born in 2022 from embryos stored for 30 years (see BioNews 1169), breaking the earlier record of 27 years (see BioNews 1075). The maximum storage limit for frozen eggs and embryos in the UK was extended in 2022 from ten to 55 years (see BioNews 1111).