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SCIENCEMonday 21 September 2015

French startup claims development of in-vitro human sperm

CATHERINE GASCHKA French researchers Philippe Durand, left, in charge of sciences at Kalistem startup, Marie-Helene Perrard, co-founder of Kalistem
LORI HINNANT and Laurent David, a scientist at Lyon University, pose at the elite scientific university of Lyon (ENS), central France, Thursday, Sept.
Associated Press 17, 2015.
LYON, France (AP) — A
French startup working Associated Press
with a top government lab
said it has developed in-vi- complex physiological de- said young men with can- 120,000 men worldwide couples are infertile, ac-
tro human sperm, claiming velopment process that cer that could cause fertil- whose infertility cannot be cording to the Mayo Clinic.
a breakthrough in infertility usually lasts 72 days in a hu- ity issues later in their lives treated any other way. Barnes said men and wom-
treatment sought for more man, from immature cell to would be the first type Ultimately, it has the poten- en each account for about
than a decade. sperm. of patient who could be tial to be a significant addi- 30 percent of infertility cas-
Researchers with Kallistem In each case, “they took helped by the process. She tion to infertility treatments es, with a combination of
had announced the dis- the entire path they would said their fertility could be that often bypass men alto- factors accounting for the
covery previously, but they have taken in the testicle preserved by developing gether, said Liberty Barnes, remaining 40 percent.
and French government in our in-vitro system,” said mature sperm from their im- a research associate at the “As a culture we presume
lab CNRS described how it Durand, who worked with mature cells, then freezing University of Cambridge that when a couple is in-
works for the first time Thurs- colleagues at CNRS and it. and author of a book on fertile it’s a woman’s prob-
day after taking out a pat- the elite Lyon 1 university. The research team said male infertility who has no lem,” Barnes said. “Infertile
ent on the process. CNRS researcher Marie- the technology could help connection to the work be- men are disappointed that
They have developed Helene Perrard, who also treat issues affecting 15,000 ing done in France. there aren’t more options
sperm from immature cells helped found Kallistem, young cancer patients and As many as 15 percent of for them.”q
known as spermatogonial
cells, which are present in
all males, including pre-pu-
bescent boys, and under
normal conditions develop
into sperm cells once pu-
berty starts.
The technology must now
be clinically tested, a pro-
cess that is particularly
painstaking for any treat-
ment involving reproduc-
tion.
Philippe Durand, the chief
Kallistem researcher, said
the genesis of the research
was indications that male
fertility was declining,
which he said could be at-
tributed to environmental
factors.
Since “at the heart of the
problem is the interior of
the testicle,” he said, that
was what they first tried to
replicate in the lab.
The research team devel-
oped a bioreactor using a
viscous fluid made partly
of substances found in the
walls of mushrooms or in
crustacean shells to repro-
duce the conditions within
the body. They first used rat
cells, then young monkey
cells, then finally human
cells.
The main challenge was
reproducing in the lab a