FOR opponents of embryo experiments, it has been a fraught week. First came permission for a British team to produce “three-parent” embryos. A day later came news that “virgin conception” embryos had been created from single, unfertilised human eggs.
On 8 September, the UK’s Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority, which regulates embryo research, gave its consent to a team at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne to create three-parent embryos for research. The aim is to tackle inherited metabolic diseases resulting from faulty DNA in mitochondria. These cell components are passed on from mother to offspring, so the idea is to replace faulty mtDNA in a…
