Originally published February 19 2006
Professors' controversial idea proposes to create hybrid embryo stem cells for the study of genetic defects
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
Professor Chris Shaw of King's College London and Professor Ian Wilmut, creator of Dolly the sheep, have proposed new experiments that would fuse human cells with rabbit eggs in the interest of creating stem cells for studying genetic defects.
British scientists are seeking permission to create hybrid embryos in the lab by fusing human cells with rabbit eggs.
If granted consent, the team will use the embryos to produce stem cells that carry genetic defects, in the hope that studying them will help understand the complex mechanisms behind incurable human diseases.
Plans for the experiments have been put forward by Professor Chris Shaw, a neurologist and expert in motor neurone disease at King's College London, and Professor Ian Wilmut, the Edinburgh University-based creator of Dolly the sheep, as a way of overcoming the shortage of fresh human eggs available for research.
By producing stem cells that carry the genetic defects of diseases, researchers believe they will be able to unravel how a cell's molecular machinery goes wrong, potentially leading to new cures for disease.
But the research is progressing slowly, hampered by a severe shortage of "spare" eggs donated by couples undergoing fertility treatment.
"As with all research involving human embryos, the research team would have to show that the research is both necessary and desirable, and that any embryo created could not be allowed to develop for longer than 14 days or be implanted in a woman," said Dr Chris O'Toole, head of research regulation at the HFEA.
In 2003, Huizhen Sheng at Shanghai Second Medical University published work in which she claimed to have extracted stem cells from hybrid embryos made from rabbit eggs.
The embryos could not legally be implanted into a woman's womb and the stem cells would not be safe to implant because they would be rejected by the immune system.
He said: "I don't see there's any ethical problem with what they are proposing.
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