A research team from the Chinese Academy of Sciences announced Thursday that they had successfully bred mice with two genetic fathers and two genetic mothers, using the gene editing tool CRISPR. This is the first time bipaternal offspring has been successfully produced. STAT News reports that only 12 of the 477 bipaternal embyros successfully made it to birth, and only two mouse pups survived more than two days. But some offspring of the bimaternal mice were able to successfully reproduce. “This research shows us what’s possible,” said Wei Li, the senior author of the study, which was published in the Stem Cell section of the journal Cell. Unfortunately, STAT News reports that the technology is still “science fiction” when it comes to humans, who have far more complex DNA than our critter counterparts.
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