Researchers at UCL and Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH) have pioneered a groundbreaking approach to studying fetal development by growing “mini-organs” from stem cells found in amniotic fluid. Published in Nature Medicine, the study marks the first time that organoids, complex cell models that mimic human organs, have been grown from stem cells during active pregnancy. This development allows for unprecedented monitoring of fetal development and disease progression in late pregnancy, including testing potential treatments for congenital conditions like congenital diaphragmatic hernia (CDH).
Previously, organoids were derived from adult stem cells or post-termination fetal tissue, limiting their use for studying late-stage fetal development. The new method bypasses these restrictions by harvesting stem cells from the amniotic fluid, which contains cells that retain the biological information of the fetus. The researchers successfully extracted stem cells from the lungs, kidneys, and intestines of 12 pregnancies and used them to grow organoids with functional characteristics of these tissues.
These organoids will provide valuable insights into both healthy and diseased fetal development, a critical area that has been largely unexplored until now. The researchers also used the organoids to study CDH, a condition where abdominal organs are displaced into the chest, and found that organoids from treated babies resembled those from healthy babies, offering a way to assess treatment effectiveness at a cellular level.
This innovative technique opens up new possibilities for prenatal medicine, allowing for better understanding of fetal conditions and offering the potential for more effective treatments and personalized prognoses in the future. The study was supported by the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) and Wellcome.
