Mitochondrial Donation Treatment

Mitochondrial Donation Treatment

A baby in UK has been created using IVF procedure with DNA of three people in a bid to prevent children from inheriting incurable diseases, reported The Guardian. 

• Known as Mitochondrial donation treatment (MDT), the procedure involves development of embryo combining sperms and eggs from the biological parents along with the mitochondria from donor’s eggs. 
• In this, approximately 1 in 5,000-10,000 children are born each year with mitochondrial disease.

MDT

• More than 99.8% of the DNA in the children would come from their mother and father. 
• Here., the idea is to prevent babies of mothers with mutated mitochondria from genetic disorders. 
• People inherit all their mitochondria from their mother.
• This isn’t the first time, a three-parent baby has been born. A US doctor in 2016 is credited with world’s first MDT birth after a Jordanian woman carrying mitochondrial mutations that could cause a fatal condition called Leigh syndrome was treated.

How its Done ?

• Eggs of the mother and a healthy female donor is fertilised using sperm from the father and the nuclear genetic material from the donor’s egg is then removed and replaced with that from the couple’s fertilised egg. 
• The resulting egg has healthy mitochondria with the full set of chromosomes from both mother and father. This is then implanted in the womb.

Practice Questions for Prelims

Consider the following statements:
1. Passing on mitochondrial diseases from parent to child can be prevented by mitochondrial replacement therapy either before or after in vitro fertilization of the egg.
2. A child inherits mitochondrial diseases entirely from mother and not from the father.

Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
a) 1 only
b) 2 only
c) Both 1 and 2
d) Neither 1 nor 2

Ans. c)

Mains Practice Question

Discuss the concept of Mitochondrial Replacement Therapy (MRT) and its potential implications for human health and reproduction.

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