SOME children conceived by a common method of IVF could be carrying chunks of bacterial DNA in their chromosomes, according to a study in mice. The researchers who conducted the work say that such accidental genetic modification would be very rare, but they argue that fertility doctors should take more precautions to exclude it.
Intracytoplasmic sperm injection, or ICSI, is used to help would-be fathers with very low sperm counts or sperm that cannot swim normally. Rather than mixing sperm and eggs in a culture dish as in conventional IVF, technicians take individual sperm and inject them into a woman’s…
