First synthetic human embryo succeeds without sperm and eggs
Research teams from the University of Cambridge and the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel announced on June 15 and 14, respectively, that they have successfully used stem cells to create the world's first synthetic human embryo model without the involvement of sperm and eggs, in pre-printed studies that were reported in Nature on June 16.
Currently, laws in many countries require that natural human embryos should not be cultured in the laboratory for more than 14 days, and researchers must use animal models to study the later stages of embryonic development, a restriction that synthetic embryo models can circumvent.
In response Nature News notes, "Such experiments could provide an unprecedented opportunity to study human embryo development, but also raise ethical and legal questions about the status of such embryo models and how they should be regulated." (Source: Nature, bioRxiv)
The signing ceremony of the Strategic Cooperation Agreement between Peking Union Medical College and University of Science and Technology of China (USTC) was held at USTC on June 15.
The two universities had signed the Strategic Cooperation Framework Agreement and the Biomedical Interdisciplinary Talent Training Program (PhD Program) Cooperation Agreement in June 2016. This signing is another strategic cooperation between Concordia, following the signing with Tsinghua University, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, and Beijing University of Technology.
In contrast to the limitations of the past, which were fragmented and single-dimensional, pan-genomic research aims to create a panoramic multidimensional map of all human genetic information. Human genome research has been conducted globally since the end of the last century, but limited by technical conditions, only a simplistic genome sketch could be drawn based on very few individuals, but with a single linear reference genome, it was difficult to adapt to the differentiated demand for genomic information.
Last month, the first human pan-genomic reference sketch was also published in Nature, with a 104% increase in the number of structural variants measured and a 34% improvement in accuracy when using the pan-genomic reference for detecting smaller genetic variants. This latest study in China has obtained 190 million new base pairs of sequences based on the original human genome, containing nearly 6 million variants, and is of great significance for exploring the core features of the Chinese population genome.
评论
发表评论