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Fertility doctors in Beijing have begun testing a new method for genome analysis of human eggs before using them for in vitro fertilization or IVF. The tests, using technology developed by a Harvard chemist, allow doctors to know the genome of a woman’s egg before it is used in IVF, which could provide a safer way to help their patients avoid genetic disorders in children.
The test is part of a larger effort by researchers to develop techniques to sequence the genomes of single cells. In some medical situations, such as when examining the scarce cancer cells that can be found in some patients’ blood (see “Finding Cancer Cells in the Blood”), doctors have only a tiny amount of genetic material to work with and so must use specialized techniques to prepare samples for DNA sequencing.
Researchers are also exploring single-cell-genomics techniques as part of screening tests in fertility clinics. Genetic analyses that are more limited than whole-genome sequencing are already widely performed on IVF embryos by plucking a single cell from an embryo to determine the...
The test is part of a larger effort by researchers to develop techniques to sequence the genomes of single cells. In some medical situations, such as when examining the scarce cancer cells that can be found in some patients’ blood (see “Finding Cancer Cells in the Blood”), doctors have only a tiny amount of genetic material to work with and so must use specialized techniques to prepare samples for DNA sequencing.
Researchers are also exploring single-cell-genomics techniques as part of screening tests in fertility clinics. Genetic analyses that are more limited than whole-genome sequencing are already widely performed on IVF embryos by plucking a single cell from an embryo to determine the...