Cloned human embryo relied on UH technology
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Advertiser Staff and News Services
Scientists who produced the first cloned human embryo in Massachusetts relied on cloning technology developed in 1997 by researchers working with mice at the University of Hawai'i.
Associated Press
Two scientists from the Hawai'i team — Tony Perry and Teruhiko Wakayama — now work for Advanced Cell Technology, the Massachusetts company that announced the breakthrough yesterday. Neither were directly involved in the human cloning project, but work they and their colleagues conducted in Hawai'i helped lay the groundwork.
Tony Perry said the cloning process may lead to new cures.
Perry, who was in Honolulu last night on business, and Stefan Moisyadi, research coordinator at the University of Hawai'i's Center for Biogenesis Research, both called most recent success by the Massachusetts researchers a promising step forward in a technology that may someday save the lives of millions of people.
ACT researchers advertised for volunteers, and after going through psychological and medical tests, some individuals were chosen to donate eggs. Others were selected to donate skin cells, which the scientists tried to fuse with the donated eggs.
Advertiser library photo • May 14, 1999
The researchers tried to generate an early embryo by growing the clones from the skin cells, but they weren't successful. That's when the knowledge of the UH team came in. While cloning mice, the UH scientists had used other cells than skin cells as donor cells.
Dr. Teruhiko Wakayama, collaborator on the Honolulu Transgenesis Method project at the University of Hawai'i, demonstrates how altered mice sperm are introduced into mice eggs.
Perry and Moisyadi said the cells used by the Hawai'i team were called cumulus cells, a type of cell that surrounds the egg like clouds, and because of the significance they played in the process, the first mouse created was named Cumulina.
All in all, the Massachusetts researchers went through 71 egg cells from seven volunteers before they got a live embryo to grow. Ultimately they managed to get three early embryos to grow — two that got to the four-cell stage and one that grew to "at least" six cells, an ACT report said.
All three early embryos apparently died after that. It remains unclear whether they harbored genetic or other defects related to the cloning process that might have prevented them from maturing.
The process, Perry said, is a long way from the goal scientists working in the field hope to someday achieve , but it is nonetheless an important step forward.
Advertiser Staff Writer Karen Blakeman contributed to this report.
