Japanese researchers have successfully generated the world's first transgenic primates capable of passing on a foreign gene to their offspring. The feat, linkurl:reported;http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v459/n7246/abs/nature08090.html in tomorrow's (May 28) issue of __Nature__, should pave the way for more sophisticated models of human disease, though the monkey models still have many hurdles to overcome.
"This is the first time that we actually can see a transgene integrated into every tissue including the germline [in a primate] and that the transgene has been passed on to the next generation," linkurl:Shoukhrat Mitalipov,;http://www.ohsu.edu/oscc/Shoukhrat_Mitalipov.php a developmental biologist at the Oregon National Primate Research Center (ONPRC) in Beaverton who wrote an accompanying linkurl:commentary;http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v459/n7246/full/459515a.html to the study, told __The Scientist__. A team led by linkurl:Erika Sasaki;http://www.ips-s.jst.go.jp/e/sakigake/saki_10.html of the Central Institute for Experimental Animals in Kawasaki, Japan, injected viral vectors containing a green fluorescence...
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("keikou" means fluorescence in Japanese) Image: E. Sasaki / Nature |
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Image: E. Sasaki / Nature |
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