They look like ordinary baby rhesus macaques, but Hex, Roku and Chimero are the world's first chimeric monkeys, each with cells from the genomes of as many as six rhesus monkeys.
Until now research on so-called chimeric animals, or those that have cells with different genomes, has been limited to mice; a recent procedure produced mice using cells from two dads.
The researchers turned to monkeys for more insight into the capabilities of embryonic stem cells. Most experiments on stem cell therapies are based on mice, and the researchers wanted to understand whether primate embryonic stem cells respond the same way as those of mice do.
To create the chimeric monkeys, researchers essentially glued together cells from individual rhesus monkey embryos and then implanting these mixed embryos into mama monkeys.
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