Scientists create spliced chimera monkey with glowing green eyes and fingers in chilling genetic engineering world-first
SCIENTISTS have created a spliced chimera monkey with glowing green eyes and fingers in a ‘Frankenscience’ world first.
The alien-like species was created by the Chinese Academy of Sciences using genetic engineering tech.
The green-eyed chimera monkey was born with stem cells taken from two embryos, and could provide answers to neurological diseases and species preservation.
Chimeras in Greek mythology is a fire-breathing monster, resembling a lion in front, a goat in the middle, and a dragon behind.
Similarly, in scientific world, chimeras are animals which contain groups of cells from two or more organisms with distinct types of DNA.
The three-old-day animal had high proportion of cells derived from the same species of monkey, crab-eating macaques, but with different, unique genes.
The chimera monkey is the first of its kind, with previous success seen with rats and mice only.
For the study, the researchers used stem cell lines – a group of cells grown in a lab from a single stem cell – taken from a seven-day-old embryo.
These cells were then injected into embryos that were four to five days old.
The embryos were implanted into female macaques, resulting in 12 pregnancies and six live births.
Of the six, one baby monkey was born alive and managed to survive for 10 days.
Analysis showed this male newborn had donor stem cells in 26 different types of tissue, ranging from 21% to up to 92%.
Meanwhile, a foetus that was miscarried was also “substantially chimeric”, the researchers said, with stem cell-derived cells observed in the brain, heart, kidney, liver, and parts of the digestive system.
The mysterious glowing eyes and fingers can be explained by the green fluorescent protein label used to determine which tissues contained cells derived from the injected stem cells.
While monkeys have been created in a lab using donor cells before, this is the first time they produced outstanding results.
Professor Mu-Ming Poo, scientific director of the Institute of Neuroscience at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, said: “Just having several cells (that) are partially distributed all over the monkey body with no real formation or clear structures – you cannot really say that is chimera, strictly speaking.
“So the difference here is that now we have a very high level of contribution, with the donor cells forming a big part of the tissues (and) complex structures all over the monkey body.”
The research could fuel further discoveries on diseases, genetical engineering and preserving endangered species.
Study leader Dr Zhen Liu, of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), said: “Specifically, this work could help us to generate more precise monkey models for studying neurological diseases as well as for other biomedicine studies.”
In 2019, Chinese scientists created the world’s first human-monkey chimera, which would allow human organs harvesting.
But the study has come under fire, raising serious ethical concerns.