In a first, fetal cell organoids generated from amniotic fluid, new study reports
Researchers at University College London reported Monday, in a first, that they had successfully generated fetal cell model organisms from amniotic fluid.
As a fetus develops, its body is bathed in amniotic fluid: a warm, salty soup of nutrients, hormones, and antibodies produced by its mother. And into that fluid, a fetus is constantly sloughing off or peeing out cells, which provide genetic material that doctors can pull out with a needle and examine for signs of disease in a process called amniocentesis. Now, researchers working in the U.K. have discovered that some of those cells are still alive, and they can be grown up into three-dimensional organoids — mini lung, kidney, and small intestines — providing a possible new tool to study and even diagnose congenital fetal diseases.
It’s “a huge shock that there are viable epithelial cells in the amniotic fluid — totally unexpected!” said stem cell researcher Emma Rawlins via email. Senior group leader at the Gurdon Institute at Cambridge University, Rawlins was familiar with the research conducted at University College London and published Monday in Nature Medicine, but was not involved in it. The cells “are a great way of growing fetal organoids from externally exposed organs,” such as the lung, kidney and intestine, she added.
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