This study used a type of iPSC called extended pluripotent stem cells that can produce both embryonic and extra-embryonic tissues. Induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) are genetically reprogrammed adult cells that revert to a stem cell identity that is crucial in development. In this work, the researchers injected 25 human induced pluripotent stem cells into six-day-old monkey embryos. But last year, a team of scientists led by Weizhi Ji at the Kunming University of Science and Technology in Yunnan, China figured out how to grow monkey embryos outside of a body for extended periods. ![]() This is hardly the first example of a chimeric mammal (see video below) researchers have been engineering interspecies mammalian chimeras since the 1970s as they studied the mechanisms of development. "An important goal of experimental biology is the development of model systems that allow for the study of human diseases under in vivo conditions." "As we are unable to conduct certain types of experiments in humans, it is essential that we have better models to more accurately study and understand human biology and disease," explained senior study author Juan Carlos Izpisua Belmonte, a professor in the Gene Expression Laboratory at the Salk Institute for Biological Sciences. ![]() The scientists are hopeful that this kind of work will tell us more about evolution and developmental biology, and may aid in the development of new research models. These chimeras were grown for 20 days almost all of them died during that time. Though they consulted bioethicists while completing their work, researchers have raised eyebrows by creating monkey-human chimeric embryos by injecting human stem cells into primate embryos.
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