That life is created from the union of an egg and a sperm is an indisputable fact. Occasionally, more than one sperm or more than one ovule, leading to multiple pregnancies, but both gametes, male and female, are always involved for the formation of the embryo.
However, in the light of scientific studies conducted in recent years, the reproduction of the human being, as we know it today, could be different in a few years. Maybe in the future sperm and ovules are not needed for a baby to be born.
So far, the experiments have been performed on mice, but their success indicates that they could also be viable in humans. Scientists believe the results are important enough to serve as a starting point for further research.
Artificially created spermatozoa
Chinese scientists published a study conducted in the journal Cell Stem Cell with the aim of finding a solution to male infertility problems.
They showed that they got create sperm from embryonic stem cells and transform them into primordial germ cells, which are those from which, by the process of meiosis, sperm are produced.
This suggests that if they work in humans, women can become a mother without the need for sperm from their partner or another man.
For its part, the biotech firm Kallistem, in collaboration with a French laboratory announced a year ago that it had managed to create human sperm in vitro from testicular stem cells.
With very few cubic millimeters of testicular tissue obtained through a biopsy of the testicles, sperm can be created through a relatively complex process that lasts 72 days.
Create a life without an egg
If the previous findings seem like science fiction, more surprising is that there can be human life without the need for an egg, the female reproductive cell.
A group of scientists from the Department of Biology and Biochemistry of the University of Bath, in the United Kingdom, they managed to reproduce mice by fertilizing a cell that was not an egg.
According to the research, published in the journal Nature created 'pseudoembryos' from altered oocytes that survive a few days, since they lack the information provided by the sperm to develop.
By injecting sperm into a partenote, the product of the unfertilized egg development, they got healthy rat pups born with a success rate of up to 24 percent. They grew and even had offspring without problems.
Although at the moment you have to start from an oocyte to make this virgin partenote or embryo, you can imagine that in the future the oocyte may be dispensed with, producing them for example from skin cells, said the study author.
You will still need a sperm that joins with an egg to give birth to a baby, but they could be created artificially from cells that originally were not reproductive cells.
Photos | iStockphoto
Via | Nature
In Babies and more | Why not adopt embryos that are destined to be discarded ?, The sperm of the first phase of the ejaculate are more effective in conceiving
