The first mouse with two biological fathers has reached adulthood: a breakthrough that gives gay people a chance to have children

A new study has shown that the first mouse with two biological fathers has survived to adulthood. Researchers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences say they have finally succeeded in breeding mice using only the genetic material of two males.

Using a technique called embryonic stem cell engineering, the scientists created eggs from the sperm of one parent that could be fertilized by the other. This is a breakthrough that gives gays a chance to have children, writes DailyMail.

Research on mice

The stem cell technique used by the researchers is not completely new, but all previous attempts have failed, experts say.

Scientists note that until now, mice raised using two sets of male genes either did not grow at all or were born with serious developmental defects that prevented them from reaching adulthood.

However, by editing 20 different genes in the mice stem cells, the researchers were able to eliminate the previous problems.

"This work will help to address several limitations in stem cell research and regenerative medicine," said study co-author Dr. Wei Li.

Although this technique is currently only possible in mice, this major breakthrough could pave the way for gay men to have children who are biologically related to both parents, experts say.

To produce offspring with two biological fathers, the researchers first had to transform male germ cells from one of the parents into female germ cells, they say.

The scientists took mouse sperm and injected it into an immature egg whose genetic material had been removed in a process called enucleation. This created a stem cell that contained only the male DNA from the first parent, the researchers explain.

Next, they took one of these stem cells and another man's sperm and injected both into another immature egg without a nucleus. These male cells combined to create an embryonic stem cell containing DNA from both parents, which was then used to create an embryo that could be implanted into a surrogate mother, experts say.

When the embryo developed, the mother gave birth to offspring that contained the genetic material of two males.

In this study, the scientists used a gene-editing technology called CRISPR to make changes to the mice's DNA and prevent abnormalities that had been present in previous failed attempts.

These changes led to the emergence of two-parent mice that were able to live to adulthood for the first time in history.

Helping gays is in question

Theoretically, a similar technique could be used to create an embryo using stem cells from one human partner and sperm from another. Although the child would still be carried by a surrogate mother, the child would still have genetic material from both parents.

The researchers are now planning to test this approach on larger animals such as monkeys, but warn that the technological hurdles will be much greater. This means that it will take years of effort to make this technique work on humans, experts say.

However, not everyone is convinced that scientists should apply this technology to humans, even if it is possible. Because the technique requires editing the genome of the parents' stem cells, and this is prohibited for humans.

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