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Published online: 22 April 2009 | doi:10.1038/nchina.2009.79

Stem cells: Cracking the egg's potential

Felix Cheung

Introduction

© (2009) Nature Cell Biology

It is commonly assumed that female mammals, including mice and humans, are born with a finite supply of eggs in their ovaries. However, this assumption has recently been challenged by the surprising finding of female germline stem cells (FGSCs) — cells that are capable of becoming fresh eggs — in the ovaries of postnatal mice. Ji Wu and co-workers at Shanghai Jiao Tong University¹ have now established FGSCs in the ovaries of neonatal mice. The finding may overturn everything we thought we knew about female reproduction.

The researchers isolated functional FGSCs from the ovaries of 5-day-old and adult mice. The FGSCs were able to maintain their proliferative potential even when cultured for many months (see image). When these FGSCs were transplanted into the ovaries of infertile mice, the mice produced new eggs and gave birth to offspring, which grew up healthy and fertile.

When the FGSCs were infected with green fluorescent protein (GFP)-tagged viruses and grafted in the ovaries, the mice produced offspring with the GFP transgene. The finding will open up new possibilities for using FGSCs in biotechnology and reproductive medicine.

The authors of this work are from:
School of Life Science and Biotechnology, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China.

Reference

1. Zou, K. et al. Production of offspring from a germline stem cell line derived from neonatal ovaries. Nature Cell Biol. doi:10.1038/ncb1869 (2009). | Article |