They insert human genes into monkey fetuses and grow their brains | the Chronicle

Scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Cell Biology Yes Genetics in Dresden (Germany) with colleagues from the Central Institute for Experimental Animals in Kawasaki and Keio University in Tokyo, Japan, conducted an experiment with marmoset fetuses by injecting them with a gene called ARHGAP11B, which directs stem cells in the human brain, and they have an enlarged brain.

“In fact, we found that the neocortex of the common marmoset’s brain was enlarged and the surface of the brain was folded up,” said Michael heath, author of the study which was published in the journal Science last July and which raises some ethical questions about genetic engineering, according to the “New York Post”.

The researchers revealed that fetal brains quickly developed larger and more advanced neocortices, an area which, in humans, constitutes the majority of the cerebral cortex.

“We are limiting our analyzes to marmoset fetuses, as we predict that expression of this specific human gene would affect the development of the neocortex in marmoset. In light of the possible unpredictable consequences on postnatal brain function, we consider this a requirement. first, and mandatory from an ethical point of view, first determine the effects of ARHGAP11B on the development of the neocortex of the fetal marmoset “, said the study co-author, Wieland Huttner.

As a result, they concluded that the human-specific ARHGAP11B gene may have caused the expansion of the neocortex during human evolution.

The human neocortex, a fraction of the brain that plays an important role in the processes of thought, language, and perception, is the evolutionarily youngest part of the cerebral cortex, and in the human species it is about three times the size than that of chimpanzees.