LONDON - The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority, which is the regulatory body for embryonic related affairs in the UK, has given the go ahead for two research projects to create human-animal hybrid embryos.
King's College London and Newcastle University have been granted one-year licenses to proceed with the project, which experts called vital in order to find effective cures for fatal diseases. The HEFA said permission to proceed was given after a public consultation showed people were not against the idea.
Ideally researchers would have wanted to work with stem cells harvested from human embryos. However because of a shortage in supply of human eggs there is a dearth of embryos that can be used for research purposes. Hence the next best thing appears to be "human-animal cytoplasmic hybrid embryo".
Researchers can create hybrid embryos by inserting human DNA into animal eggs. The animal eggs most often used are from the cow. These hybrid embryos are allowed to develop for two weeks after which stem cells are harvested and the embryos destroyed.
The King's College research is headed by Dr Stephen Minger, who will be studying Alzheimer's disease, spinal muscular atrophy and Parkinson's disease using these hybrid cells. "Now that we have the license we can start work as soon as possible," Dr Armstrong revealed. "We have already done a lot of the work by transferring animal cells into cow eggs so we hope to make rapid progress."
Lyle Armstrong and colleagues at the Newcastle University will study how stem cells differentiate into various tissues in the body.
However critics find the idea of animal-human embryos repulsive. The Society for the Protection of Unborn Children (SPUC) blasted the HEFA for issuing the licenses, adding that such a step was "disastrous setback for human dignity in Britain."
