Same-sex couples might be able to have babies of their own and no longer need to adpot thanks to a new medical breakthrough.
Researchers at Cambridge University discovered that it is possible to make human egg and sperm cells using the skin from two adults of the same gender. The team worked with Israel's Weizmann Institute of Science and used the stem cell lines from embryos collected from the skin of five different adults. To date, they have created new germ-cell lines from 10 different donors.
The same experiment was successful using mice as subjects, but this study is the first to test it on humans. The team compared the engineered cells made from the laboratory to aborted fetuses to determine if they are identical.
"We have succeeded in the first and most important step of this process, which is to show we can make these very early human stem cells in a dish," Azim Surani, project leader and professor of physiology and reproduction at Cambridge, told the Sunday Times.
Surani and his colleagues started using the technique in humans since last year when they created artificial human eggs and sperm for the first time. The researchers identified a gene called SOX17, which decides which cells become sperm and egg cells.
The researchers said the new technique should be able to create a baby in just two years.
"It has already caused interest from gay groups because of the possibility of making egg and sperm cells from parents of the same sex," Jacob Hanna, the specialist leading the project's Israeli arm, said to the Sunday Times.
The study was published in the journal Cell.
