Introduction of Designer Babies

Introduction of Designer Babies

By: Megan Kang

Designer baby is a baby that has been genetically modified. A designer baby is a term used to describe a baby who has been artificially made using in-vitro fertilization. Designer babies refer to the genetic modification of human sex cells in order to produce a baby with desired characteristics. To achieve this, several steps are taken leading up to the completed embryo. First, a procedure is performed on embryos before the implantation. This process is frequently called Embryo screening but is also called pre-implantation genetic diagnosis. This medical procedure allows the parents to keep or discard the embryo. Scientists remove a cell ( within the first five days of its creation) and the cell is genetically tested. Then the parents decide if they would like to keep or discard the embryo.   This process was used to ensure that babies did not have genetic defects in the past. However, recently this process has been used to select desired nonmedical traits such as hair color, sex, eye color, etc.

http://designerbabies-information.weebly.com/how-do-designer-babies-work.html

http://science.howstuffworks.com/life/genetic/designer-children.htm