Today is a remarkable day in history as scientists have managed to grow the embryo of a mammal outside of the womb, for the first time.
Researchers at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel have revealed in their study (published in the journal Nature) that they¡¯ve managed to grow over 1,000 mice embryos for six days with the help of a process that uses a mechanical device.?
The experiment was split into different stages with the very first one being removing the mice from their mother¡¯s wombs after a five-day gestation period.?
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Dr Jacob Hanna, one of the researchers of the project in a conversation with New York Times revealed that the team has successfully managed to extract an embryo from a female mouse right after fertilisation and grew it for 11 days -- with the lab-grown embryos being very identical to the naturally growing ones.?
The machine that helped the team achieve this has been in the making for nearly seven years. This is a two-part system that includes an incubator as well as a ventilation system.?
The embryo sits in a vial that also contains a fluid with special nutrients. A wheel keeps the embryos spinning to prevent them from sticking to the wall of the vial, which in-turn prevents deformation and can even result in death.
It takes a gestation period of 20 days for the mouse to come to a point where it can survive without an embryo. Sadly, with the machine, this maxes out at just 11 days, as after that just nutrients in the vial aren¡¯t enough -- it requires constant supply of blood and that¡¯s a challenge researchers are yet to overcome.
Hanna states that they¡¯re looking to develop an artificial blood supply that could connect to mice¡¯s placentas, but this is still under development.
You might be wondering why would someone want to build a device like this. The researchers are doing this to better understand how environmental conditions and genetic mutations can impact the growth of a foetus inside of a womb.?
Their end goal however is to one day allow scientists to grow a human baby, but there¡¯s a lot of research and challenges that exist before we arrive on that day.?