“Chinese Scientists Create Monkey Embryo-like Structures from Stem Cells”

Jakarta –

Scientists in China created embryo-like structures from monkey stem cells. The structure was implanted in a surrogate female monkey and grew briefly but did not become a viable fetus.

In recent years, scientists in China are working to create entirely synthetic embryos, meaning embryos produced without the typical fertilization of an egg by a sperm. The research, published in the journal Cell Stem Cell, marks the first time scientists in China have created embryo-like structures from monkey embryonic stem cells.

Quoted from Science Direct, the researchers also transferred this embryo-like structure into the uterus of a female monkey and determined that the structure is capable of implanting and producing a hormonal response similar to pregnancy.

Last year, two separate teams announced that they had made such embryos from mouse stem cells. In one study, embryos survived up to eight and a half days and even developed a rudimentary brain and beating heart (a typical mouse gestation was 20 days).

“Because monkeys are closely related to humans evolutionarily, we hope that this model study will deepen our understanding of human embryonic development, including shedding light on some of the causes of early miscarriage.” said co-author Zhen Liu of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) in Shanghai.

The researchers started with monkey embryonic stem cells, which they exposed to a number of growth factors in cell culture. These factors induce stem cells to form embryo-like structures for the first time using non-human primate cells.

When studied under a microscope, embryo-like structures, also called blastoids, were found to have a similar morphology to natural blastocysts. As they progress further in vitro, they form structures that look like the amnion and yolk sac.

The blastoid also begins to form the cell types that eventually form the three germ layers of the body. Single-cell RNA sequencing revealed that the different types of cells found within the structures had gene expression patterns similar to cells found in natural blastocysts or post-implantation embryos.

The scientists then took some of these embryo-like cells and transferred them into the wombs of eight female monkeys. In three monkeys, the structures implanted into the lining of the uterus representing the first step of pregnancy.

The team confirmed the pregnancy by ultrasound and also detected the hormones progesterone and chorionic gonadotropin, which are present during pregnancy. The transplanted structures also form the early gestational sac, the fluid-filled cavity that surrounds the developing embryo. But the pregnancy was short-lived. These sacs disappear after about a week. No fetus is formed.

In future work, the researchers plan to focus on further developing embryo-like structure culturing systems from monkey cells.

“This will provide us with a useful model for future studies. Further applications of the monkey blastoid could help dissect the molecular mechanisms of primate embryo development,” said co-author Fan Zhou from Tsinghua University.

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(kna/suc)