In Japan, researchers have created viable mice with two biological fathers. The team led by Katsuhiko Hayashi from the University of Osaka converted skin cells from male mice into egg cells in the laboratory in several steps, , as the researchers write in the journal Nature. These eggs were fertilized with sperm from other male mice. The resulting embryos were then carried by a female mouse as a surrogate mother. From a genetic point of view, the offspring has two fathers, but no mother.
Hayashi had already presented the results last week at a congress in London.Now the team has published its data in a highly regarded journal. Mice with two biological mothers were introduced several years ago.
The approach of the Japanese researchers is not yet particularly efficient. Of 630 embryos transferred to surrogate mothers, only seven were born as living mouse babies. These were all adults, in a female and a male specimen could also be shown that the two-father mice are capable of reproduction, as the scientists around Hayashi write.
_blank https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-00755-1 Jonathan Bayerl and Diana Laird of the University of California, San Francisco, write Jonathan Bayerl and Diana Laird of the University of California, San Francisco, in an accompanying commentary.
So far, the technology is far from being transferred to humans.»There are big differences between mice and humans,» Hayashi said recently at the conference in London. Nevertheless, the work raises various questions – such as whether gay couples and transgender couples could eventually have children with genes from both partners without the ethical and legal problems associated with donor eggs, write Bayerl and Laird. (dpa/kmh)
Source — https://www.spektrum.de/news/maeusebabys-mit-zwei-vaetern-geboren/2120406