A National Academy of Medicine (formerly known as the Institute of Medicine) committee has given conditional backing to the use of mitochondrial replacement techniques (MRT). Three-person in vitro fertilisation was approved and legalized in the United Kingdom last year, but has been banned by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration since 2001, despite having been used to conceive a patient back in 2000. Mitochondrial replacement is intended to allow a couple to conceive a child, but with healthy mitochondria inserted into the embryo from a female donor:
Would it be ethical for scientists to try to create babies that have genetic material from three different people? An influential panel of experts has concluded the answer could be yes. The 12-member panel, assembled by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, released a 164-page report Wednesday outlining a plan for how scientists could ethically pursue the controversial research. "The committee concludes that it is ethically permissible" to conduct such experiments, the report says, but then goes on to detail a long list of conditions that would have to be met first.
For example, scientists would have to perform extensive preliminary research in the laboratory and with animals to try make sure it is safe. And then researchers should initially try to make only male babies, because they would be incapable of passing their unusual amalgamation of DNA on to future generations. "Minimizing risk to future children should be of highest priority," the committee writes.
The report was requested by the Food and Drug Administration in response to applications by two groups of scientists in New York and Oregon to conduct the experiments. Their goal is to help women have healthy babies even though they come from families plagued by [mitochondrial] genetic disorders.
The PDF of the report, "Mitochondrial Replacement Techniques: Ethical, Social, and Policy Considerations" (DOI: 10.17226/21871) is 8.1 MB and can be downloaded "as guest" with no email confirmation.
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The BBC reports that three-person IVF will soon be legal in the United Kingdom. The procedure involves replacing mitochondrial DNA in an embryo from that of a second woman in order to eliminate deadly mitochondrial genetic disorders. Alana Saarinen was successfully conceived in the U.S. using the procedure back in 2000, but the FDA banned ooplasm transfer in 2001.
The UK has now become the first country to approve laws to allow the creation of babies from three people. The modified version of IVF has passed its final legislative obstacle after being approved by the House of Lords. The fertility regulator will now decide how to license the procedure to prevent babies inheriting deadly genetic diseases. The first baby could be born as early as 2016. A large majority of MPs in the House of Commons approved "three-person babies" earlier this month. The House of Lords tonight rejected an attempt to block the plan by a majority of 232. Estimates suggest 150 couples would be suitable to have babies through the technique each year.
Additional coverage at Wired UK and The Guardian.
Related: UK Parliament Gives Three-"Source" IVF the Go-Ahead.
A study by Newcastle University researchers has found that three-person in vitro fertilization is safe (does not adversely affect embryos) and can be routinely performed. Three-person IVF allows the transfer of donor mitochondria into an embryo in order to prevent mitochondrial disease:
Published today in the journal Nature, scientists at the Wellcome Trust Centre for Mitochondrial Disease at Newcastle University report the first in-depth analysis of human embryos created using a new technique designed to reduce the risk of mothers passing on mitochondrial disease to their children, which is debilitating and often life-limiting.
[...] Today researchers, in a study involving over 500 eggs from 64 donor women, publish results that indicate that the new procedure does not adversely affect human development and will greatly reduce the level of faulty mitochondria in the embryo. Their results suggest that the technique will lead to normal pregnancies whilst also reducing the risk of babies having mitochondrial disease. The results of this study will be considered by the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority's (HFEA) Expert Scientific Panel. The HFEA will ultimately decide whether to issue the first licence to a clinic. A licensed clinic would allow couples affected by mitochondrial disease to have the choice of whether to use pronuclear transfer to try and have healthy children.
Also at the BBC. You can fill out this form to donate eggs or sperm to the Newcastle Fertility Centre at Life.
Towards clinical application of pronuclear transfer to prevent mitochondrial DNA disease (DOI: 10.1038/nature18303)
Previously: UK Approves Three-Person IVF Babies
U.S. Panel Gives Tentative Endorsement to Three-Person IVF
Scientists have recreated heteroplasmy by producing embryos with both maternal and paternal mitochondrial DNA:
A new study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) from the University of Missouri has succeeded in creating embryos with "heteroplasmy," or the presence of both maternal and paternal mitochondrial DNA. This new innovation will allow scientists to study treatments for mitochondrial diseases in humans as well as the significance of mitochondrial inheritance for livestock.
When parents pass along their genes to their children, most of the DNA from the mother and father is evenly divided. However, children only receive one type of [mitochondrial DNA] from their mothers, while the fathers' mitochondrial DNA is naturally removed from the embryos. Peter Sutovsky, a professor of reproductive physiology at Mizzou and lead author Won-Hee Song, a doctoral candidate in the Mizzou College of Agriculture, Food and Natural Resources, have found a way to prevent this paternal mitochondrial DNA removal process in pig embryos, thus creating embryos with "heteroplasmy."
"As many as 4,000 children are born in the U.S. every year with some form of mitochondrial disease, which can include poor growth, loss of muscle coordination, learning disabilities and heart disease," Sutovsky said. "Some scientists believe some of these diseases may be caused by heteroplasmy, or cells possessing both maternal and paternal mitochondrial DNA. We have succeeded in creating this condition of heteroplasmy within pig embryos, which will allow scientists to further study whether paternal heteroplasmy could cause mitochondrial diseases in humans."
Autophagy and ubiquitin–proteasome system contribute to sperm mitophagy after mammalian fertilization (DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1605844113) (DX)
Previous/Related:
Project to Repair Mitochondria Funded
Three-Person Babies Could Be Possible in Two Years
U.S. Panel Gives Tentative Endorsement to Three-Person IVF
Newcastle University Study Verifies Safety of Three-Person IVF
Singapore could become the second country to legalize mitochondrial replacement therapy
This small city state could become the second country—after the United Kingdom—to explicitly legalize mitochondrial replacement therapy (MRT), a controversial assisted reproduction technique that allows women who are carriers of some rare genetic disorders to give birth to healthy babies.
Members of the Singaporean public and religious groups have until 15 June to provide their feedback about MRT to the Bioethics Advisory Committee (BAC). Based on its findings, a 13-member BAC review committee will make formal recommendations to the government later this year about whether to legalize the technology.
"Our position is to keep a close watch on what happens in the U.K., to track the U.K. experience, and to learn from what they have done," says Oi Lian Kon, who studies human genetics at the National Cancer Centre Singapore and is leading the BAC review group.
MRT is used to address devastating genetic diseases that arise from abnormalities in the DNA in mitochondria, the cell's power sources, and that commonly affect energy-intensive organs such as the brain and heart, as well as muscles. Children inherit mitochondria only from their mothers; replacing faulty mitochondria in an egg or embryo with normal ones from a donor can result in healthy babies. But it also means that offspring will bear DNA from three "parents," which makes MRT a controversial procedure.
Previously: UK Parliament Gives Three-"Source" IVF the Go-Ahead.
Approval for Three-Parent Embryo Trials
UK's Fertility Regulator Approves Creation of First "Three-Parent" Babies
Related: U.S. Panel Gives Tentative Endorsement to Three-Person IVF
Newcastle University Study Verifies Safety of Three-Person IVF
First Three-Person Baby Born Using Spindle Nuclear Transfer
Baby Girl Born in Ukraine Using Three-Parent Pronuclear Transfer Technique
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 05 2016, @03:39PM
i can't wait to be a useless piece of shit all day and fertilize all these eggs with three parents
FUCK I'M FALLING DOWN ALL THESE SLIPPERY SLOPES
I WARNED YOU ABOUT SLIPPERY SLOPES BRO!!! I TOLD YOU DOG!
IT KEEPS HAPPENING
I TOLD YOU MAN
I TOLD YOU ABOUT SLIPPERY SLOPES
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Gravis on Friday February 05 2016, @05:55PM
if your highest priority is to minimize the "risk to future children," then shouldn't you just avoid the whole damn thing and sterilize the person with the defective DNA? we don't need people that have bad DNA to conceive and raise children, so this is just another pursuit to fulfill selfish desires. i'm not against science, progress or genetic manipulation but let's call a spade a spade because there is no shortage of humans.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 05 2016, @07:05PM
It's not as though we don't have enough old people already. Shouldn't we just withhold Grandma's cancer meds? We don't need old people, so this is just another pursuit to fulfill selfish desires. Let's call a spade a spade because there is no shortage of humans.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 06 2016, @02:38AM
Action T4 welcomes you both!
http://www.euthanasia.com/t4.html [euthanasia.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 06 2016, @05:51PM
Try to keep up.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 06 2016, @10:14PM
In both cases you're attempting to make other people's medical choices for them. Try to keep up.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday February 05 2016, @05:56PM
I can see development of these techniques for breeding better livestock, hardier crops, and even exotic pets, but why exactly does a couple with reproductive deficiency _need_ to create a child from portions of their genomes combined with third party mitochondria?
I certainly understand the desire to pass on your DNA, but if your DNA isn't fertile on its own - isn't that risking passing a heavy burden onto your offspring?
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 3, Insightful) by EvilSS on Friday February 05 2016, @06:09PM
It is not that their DNA isn't "Fertile" or is even defective. It's that there is a defect in the mother's mitochondria. With this technique the child inherits it's parents DNA but not the defective mitochondria. There is no "burden" to be passed on at that point.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday February 05 2016, @06:28PM
Why, then, the ethical concern over female offspring?
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by vux984 on Friday February 05 2016, @08:07PM
I would speculate that it has something to do with the fact that mitochondria is only passed down to future generations from the female. So if the created offspring here is male, it won't pass on the mitchochondria to future generations; and future generations will not be affected by the 3 person IVF that was used to create him.
(Score: 2) by EvilSS on Monday February 08 2016, @05:52PM
It's just an over-abundance of caution. They want to study the procedure before allowing it just in case it causes some unforeseen issue with the mitochondria. This way it won't be passed down. The odds of this are essentially nil but they are playing it very safe. Other countries have not seen a reason to impose the same restrictions.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 05 2016, @06:23PM
there is the chance that the mitochondrial dna is acctually okay,
but that the other dna is defect and is acctually poisoning/damaging the
mitochondrial dna?
there are theories that long time ago the regular dna and mitochondrial dna
where seperate ...uhm... errr ... entities.
the spirochat(?) like mitochondria was like a seperate organism that got
incoporated into the dna-only organism and together they formed a
kind of symbiosis ("i help you, you help me. together we are stronger").
so it is possible that even though the regular dna gives the shape and size and color etc.
of what we call a person, it cannot work correctly if the mitochondrial dna isnt
present, defectif or ...isnt sufficiently compatible to form a working
"symbiosis".
the result of the 3 person solution could result in a situation where the 3 person offspring
has dna that is still poisoning the mitochondrial dna, which would lead to
having to always use 3 persons to make any future offspring?
sanctioned defectivness and good for future stock prices of vital for survival "3-person-r-us"
outlets/clinics?