A growing solution to a problem of conception
What are three-parent babies?
In February 2015, the United Kingdom legalized a strange scientific notion. The UK became the first country in history to legalize the conception of three-parent babies.
In regular conception, an egg is fertilized by sperm, resulting in the creation of a progeny with half of its DNA from its mother and half from its father. In the case of a three-parent baby, an offspring contain DNA from its father, as well as DNA from two mothers. To the readers of this week’s Science Avenue, please note that, with changing trends in obstetrics, I feel that there is no longer such a thing as “normal conception,” and will refer to the traditional method of conception by its accurate description: sexual intercourse.
The options available to those individuals looking to create offspring that share their parents genetic material is wide and varied, and sexual intercourse is no longer the only manner in which children can be conceived.
How do three-parent babies work?
The most common “production” of three-parent babies occurs through a process known as cytoplasmic transfer. This process requires three individuals – a sperm donor, and two egg donors. In all, the process is remarkably straightforward: cytoplasm from a donor egg is injected into a recipient egg with damaged mitochondria. The new egg, which contains genetic information from two egg donors, is then fertilized by sperm, and implanted in the womb of the egg donor with damaged mitochondria. The resulting offspring that grows from this union contains genetic information from three parents.
Mitochondria is often referred to as the “powerhouse” of a cell, because it generates most of a cell’s ATP – a source of chemical energy. Compromised mitochondria is thought to be related to a host of neurological, circulatory, functional, and digestive illnesses, including diabetes mellitus and deafness, Leigh syndrome, neuropathy, ataxia, retinitis pigmentosa, and ptosis, and Leber’s hereditary optic neuropathy.
Three-parent babies only contain genetic information from so-called “healthy” donors. Assuming that the sperm donor contains no genetic abnormalities, the resulting offspring grows to be healthy, able to pass on uncompromised genetic material.
Why are three-parent babies important?
Before approaching this article, I joked that engaging in sexual intercourse to conceive – resulting in two-parent offspring – is horribly inefficient. By taking out the guess work in conception, humans can insure that their offspring suffer from few genetic deficiencies.
This method of explanation is, of course, a fallacy. Reproduction through sexual intercourse is inefficient in the same way that breathing without a respirator is inefficient – it is the result of countless generations of variance and mutation, leading to the best available method (outside of obvious genetic engineering unavailable in nature) to propagate the human species.
Three-parent babies are important because they represent a leap forward in genetic engineering. For the intents and purposes of hyperbole, humans have found a way to safely “grow” healthy, genetically normal children. Furthermore, by including one more genetic donor into the mix, three-parent offspring are theoretically more fit to provide their genetic material to subsequent generations.
What is the future of three-parent babies?
As of the time of this writing, the United Kingdom is the only country on Earth that has legalized the conception of three-parent offspring. In fact, the United States outlawed and banned the cytoplasmic transfer procedure in 2001.
Over the course of the next century, lawmakers and legislators will need to convene and agree upon new definitions for genetically engineered organisms. It is important to recognize that the three-parent baby debate is not about whether parents should adopt or not. The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recognizes three-parent offspring as “biological products” subject to the same regulation as medicine and drugs. That the FDA fails to consider human children as human is indicative of the clear revisions in policy that must occur for the human race to continue its scientific advancement.
I’m a firm believer that science should not be hindered by morality, ethics, or politics. In the case of certain issues, however, that particular opinion is clearly in the minority.