HFEA lifts ban on frozen eggs
The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) announced on Tuesday its decision to allow the 'carefully controlled use of frozen eggs in fertility treatment'...
News
Image by Peter Artymiuk via the Wellcome Collection. Depicts the shadow of a DNA double helix, on a background that shows the fluorescent banding of the output from a DNA sequencing machine.
US government stops gene therapy trials
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) shut down eight gene therapy trials at the University of Pennsylvania last week as a result of an ongoing investigation. All the trials have been halted 'indefinitely' after FDA findings of 'serious deficiencies' in the supervision and monitoring of one gene therapy trial...
Image by Sílvia Ferreira, Cristina Lopo and Eileen Gentleman via the Wellcome Collection. Depicts a single human stem cell embedded within a porous hydrogel matrix (false colour).
Embryo-free cloning
Scientists at Geron BioMed, the company launched after a merger between the team that cloned Dolly the sheep at the Roslin Institute in Edinburgh and a stem cell research company in the US, is now concentrating on therapeutic cloning techniques that do not require human egg cells. Cloning in the...
Image by Peter Artymiuk via the Wellcome Collection. Depicts the shadow of a DNA double helix, on a background that shows the fluorescent banding of the output from a DNA sequencing machine.
Genetic link to suicide
Scientists at the Royal Ottawa Hospital in Canada have made claims that they have identified a 'suicide gene', a gene that may predispose certain people to commit suicide. Those who carry the mutated gene are said to be more than twice as likely to kill themselves than those without the...
Image by Sílvia Ferreira, Cristina Lopo and Eileen Gentleman via the Wellcome Collection. Depicts a single human stem cell embedded within a porous hydrogel matrix (false colour).
Japanese create second-generation cow clone
A 96-pound bull calf born in Japan last weekend is the first large mammal to be 're-cloned'. The calf has been successfully cloned from the clone of a bull. Scientists in America had previously only produced second-generation clones in mice. The Japanese scientists at the Kagoshima Prefectural Cattle Breeding...
Surrogate twins can stay in UK
The surrogate twins of a homosexual British couple have been granted indefinite leave to stay in the UK by the Home Secretary. Last month, the twins had been denied automatic entry to the country by Heathrow Airport immigration officials when their two fathers tried to bring them in from America...
Selected biotech news
Biotechnology stocks are being tipped to 'do in 2000 what Internet stocks did in 1999' - that is, make money. The reason for this, it is postulated, is that 'we are on the brink of a revolution in drug discovery and manufacture, which will result, ultimately, in customised medicines'. This is...
Comment
What's so wrong with egg freezing for 'career women'?
by Juliet Tizzard
When the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) announced last week that it has lifted its ban on the use of frozen eggs in fertility treatment, I expected a few columnists to make ill-formed, platitudinous observations about the news...