Human embryos made from skin cells

A US company says it has created cloned human embryos of a group of men from their skin cells. Stemagen Corp, a private company based in La Jolla, California, used a technique called somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT) to create the embryos. In their experiments, the researchers removed the nuclei of mature egg cells from healthy young women who had previously donated eggs for successful infertility treatments. Scientists then inserted DNA from an adult male donor into the eggs. Several of the reconstructed eggs continued to develop as normal embryos, and three of the embryos were shown in genetic tests to have the same DNA as their male fibroblast donors.

Aust 18 Jan 2008