Prospect of Synthetic Embryos Sparks New Bioethics Debate

September 19, 2017

(MIT Technology Review) – The embryo-like structures, the team soon determined, are not complete and couldn’t become a person. They lack the cell types needed to make a placenta, a heart, or a brain. Even so, the Michigan “embryoids” are realistic enough that the lab has been destroying them using a bath of detergent or formaldehyde to make sure they don’t develop any further.