Human blastoids give insight into implantation
Scientists have created a 'blastoid' model of the human embryo at early-stages that can successfully attach to uterine cells in vitro, mimicking the implantation of an embryo in the mother's uterus...
BioNews
Pluripotency
Describes a cell capable of developing into any type of cell or tissue except those that form a placenta or embryo.
102 articles
Embryonic stem cells can self-destruct when defective
Insight into genetic control of human embryonic stem cells' fate has offered new insight into cancer genetics and could inform future work in regenerative medicine...
Embryo-like structures created out of human stem cells
A new model of the human embryo made from stem cells has been developed by researchers in the USA...
Image by Alan Handyside via the Wellcome Collection. Depicts a human egg soon after fertilisation, with the two parental pronuclei clearly visible.
Functional sperm developed from mouse pluripotent stem cells
Researchers in Japan have successfully demonstrated the development of functional sperm cells that developed into fertile offspring from pluripotent embryonic stem cells, in mice...
Changing the Human Genome: What Next for Germline Genome Editing?
PET's latest online event discussed the recently published reports from the World Health Organisation on human genome editing...
Early pregnancy loss may be explained by embryo development discovery
Key molecular events regulating early embryo development have been revealed for the first time...
Human/monkey chimeric embryos: context and questions
On 15 April 2021, the journal Cell published a paper reporting the creation of part monkey, part human embryos...
The question of embryohood
Students of bioethics sometimes imagine that the philosophical, moral and legal status of the human embryo is reducible to the single question: 'Is the human embryo a person?'...
Failure in sperm growth is linked to testicular cancer
Early embryonic germ cells, which fail to develop into sperm cells, may later become testicular cancer cells, a study in mice has shown...
Image by Bill Sanderson via the Wellcome Collection, © Wellcome Trust Ltd 1990. Depicts Laocoön and his family (from Greek and Roman mythology) entwined in coils of DNA.
Making embryos: a new way?
Recently there have been some phenomenal reports describing the ability to generate human embryo-like entities directly from stem cells, circumventing the need for eggs and sperm...