Life Sciences: Year In Review 2013

Molecular Biology and Genetics

Assisted Reproductive Technology

Assisted reproductive technology took a major step forward in 2013 when the U.K.-based Nuffield Council on Bioethics ruled that new techniques that enabled the in vitro fertilization (IVF) of human eggs containing nuclear DNA from one woman and cytoplasm and mitochondrial DNA from another woman were ethical and could proceed. The new techniques were developed in order to increase the chances of having a healthy baby for women whose nuclear DNA (which is located in the cell nucleus) was normal but whose mitochondrial DNA (which is located in the cell cytoplasm in organelles known as mitochondria) carried disease-causing mutations. Scientists estimated that one in 4,000 people carried serious disease-causing mutations in their mitochondrial DNA. Critics raised objections to the ruling, however, claiming that infants born as a result of the new technology would be “three-parent babies”—having one father and two mothers. The ensuing controversy about the biological and social definitions of parenthood was debated by ethicists and politicians. Meanwhile, families affected by mitochondrial disorders celebrated the possibility that one day their daughters might be able to bear healthy children.

  • An embryologist uses a microscope to view an embryo, visible on the monitor at right, at a fertility clinic in New York City in October 2013. New techniques that allowed the in vitro fertilization of human eggs containing nuclear DNA from one woman and cytoplasm and mitochondrial DNA from another woman were debated during the year.
    Richard Drew/AP Images

Louise Brown, the world’s first “test tube baby,” conceived outside the human body via IVF, was born in 1978. Brown was a healthy infant, and as an adult she was able to conceive naturally and have children without the need for assisted reproductive technologies. The success of her birth encouraged the use of IVF. By 2013 the technique had been used to help more than four million women conceive their own children.

Embryos conceived by IVF undergo their first stages of development in a laboratory dish, where they are accessible to minimally invasive genetic testing. As a result, embryos can be screened for mutations before implantation into the womb, which thereby helps prevent the transmission of devastating genetic defects to offspring. Such early testing, performed when the embryo is a small ball of cells rather than a developing fetus, is particularly useful for couples who want biological children born free of a familial genetic disease but who are unwilling to terminate an affected pregnancy after traditional first- or second-trimester prenatal testing.

Whereas a woman passes copies of only half her nuclear DNA to each egg (the father contributes the other half), she passes copies of all, or nearly all, of her mitochondrial DNA to each egg (the father does not contribute any mitochondrial DNA). As a result, women who carried mutations in their mitochondrial DNA inevitably would pass on those mutations to their offspring, and genetic screening thus provided no benefit in terms of preventing the transmission of mitochondrial diseases. As an example, maternally inherited nuclear-DNA mutations in the retinoblastoma 1 gene (RB1), which cause potentially deadly eye tumours in childhood, would affect only half of an affected woman’s embryos, enabling healthy embryos to be selected for implantation. By contrast, mutations in mitochondrial DNA that cause Leber hereditary optic neuropathy (LHON), which leads to vision loss, would affect every embryo. A woman who carried LHON-causing mutations in mitochondrial genes would not be able to pass on her nuclear DNA to a child without also passing on her high risk of LHON.

A potential solution to this quandary emerged when technical advances in IVF, developed through experimentation in laboratory animals, demonstrated that embryos and healthy offspring could be generated from hybrid eggs that carried nuclear DNA from one woman’s egg but cytoplasm, and therefore mitochondrial DNA, from another, unrelated woman’s egg. Although a variety of techniques could be applied to create those hybrids, two of the most promising were pronuclear transfer and spindle transfer.

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In pronuclear transfer the manipulation was conducted shortly after fertilization, before the egg and sperm pronuclei had fused (the pronucleus of an egg or a sperm contains the 23 nuclear chromosomes it will contribute to the baby). The pronuclei were removed from the fertilized egg of the mitochondrial-DNA donor and were replaced with pronuclei harvested from the fertilized egg of the woman who would have the child. In spindle transfer all manipulations were conducted on eggs prior to fertilization, potentially avoiding the ethical or political complications of working with fertilized eggs, which could be considered by some to be early embryos. Spindle transfer involved the physical transfer of a meiosis II (MII) stage spindle, to which the nuclear DNA (in the form of condensed chromosomes) was attached, from one egg to the cytoplasm of another egg that had been enucleated (had had its nucleus removed). (The spindle is a structure that is formed during cell division, with meiosis being the division of the cells that give rise to sperm and eggs.)

Both techniques worked repeatedly in nonhuman primates and in some limited tests using human eggs discarded from medical procedures. Follow-up studies of the resulting embryos demonstrated only minimal presence of mitochondrial DNA originating from the nuclear-DNA donor. The June 2013 ruling by the Nuffield Council on Bioethics paved the way for further testing using human eggs.

Seeing the Genome Beyond the Genes

Major strides were made in 2013 concerning scientists’ understanding of genomes. The early view of a genome was that it was a collection of genes interspersed with “noncoding,” or non-protein-producing, sequences that facilitated the maintenance, packaging, inheritance, and expression of genes. Noncoding sequences had been considered minor components, but as DNA sequencing became less costly and as increasing numbers of species’ genomes were sequenced, a challenge to this view of the genome emerged. It became apparent that the vast majority of sequences in animal (and plant) genomes were not genes, or at least were not genes as defined traditionally. For example, of the more than three billion base pairs of DNA sequence in the human genome, only about 3% were found to be composed of protein-coding genes. The remainder consisted of elements whose functions were yet unknown.

Most large genomes were known to contain repeated sequences, some of which were believed to be homologous to known viral genomes. The repeated sequences were thought by some to be the remains of viruses that had invaded the host repeatedly over the course of evolutionary time and had then become fixed in the host genome. However, most intergenic DNA (the DNA between protein-coding sequences) did not bear homology to known viruses; it was, rather, simply sequence of unknown function. Some argued that the extra DNA had no beneficial function and was a form of molecular parasite—replicated and maintained because the burden was insufficient to compromise the evolutionary fitness of the host. The epithet “junk DNA” was sometimes used to describe the large stretches of non-protein-coding DNA, which composed the vast majority of the human genome and filled the spaces between recognized genes.

In the early 21st century, as new classes of RNA transcripts were discovered and mapped to previously dubbed “junk” regions of the genome, the “parasitic DNA” hypothesis was also challenged. In 2013 it was essentially overturned by the results of a data-collection project called the Encyclopedia of DNA Elements (ENCODE), which had been launched in 2003 by the U.S. National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI). Researchers involved with ENCODE, who composed the majority of the so-called ENCODE Consortium, applied a combination of approaches, including next-generation DNA-sequencing technologies and chromatin-structure analysis, to define the sequence conservation, chemical modification, packaging, transcription, and apparent biological impact of sequences across the genome. The researchers looked at all DNA sequences, not just previously recognized genes. Standardized data analysis and data-reporting tools allowed for comparisons of sequence data generated by the different ENCODE researchers. All the ENCODE data were deposited into public databases and were free for public use.

The ENCODE results demonstrated that the human genome is not predominantly junk. For example, although only 2.94% of the human genome was shown to consist of protein-coding genes, as much as 75% was found to be transcribed, at one time or another, in at least one type of cell. One class of those noncoding transcripts was composed of microRNAs (miRNAs), which are very short segments of RNA (about 20 nucleotides in length). More than 4,000 different miRNAs have been identified. The tiny transcripts bind to the RNA messages of protein-coding genes and modulate their expression, thereby helping orchestrate the molecular changes that underlie cell and tissue growth, differentiation, and homeostasis. Mutations or other changes in miRNAs can cause disease, including cancer. Developing therapeutics to regulate or circumvent disease-causing miRNA changes therefore offered new hope for intervention. The ubiquity and conservation of miRNAs across species suggested that other classes of RNA “switches” likely existed in the genomic sequence. The ENCODE results provided a humbling reminder that although scientists knew the nucleotide sequence of the entire human genome, they had barely scratched the surface in understanding what those sequences meant.


By 2013 it had been 21 years since paleontologists claimed to have discovered red blood cells in a bone slice from a 67-million-year-old Tyrannosaurus rex. After a number of tests confirmed their results, they found other types of soft-tissue features, including what they thought were blood vessels. Skeptics, however, argued that these organic structures were actually biofilm, a type of slime formed by microbes that entered the bone after death.

  • The femur from a fossilized dinosaur embryo found in Yunnan province, China, and dating to the Early Jurassic Period provided new insight into dinosaur embryonic development in 2013.
    A. LeBlanc—University of Toronto/AP Images

A printed report that emerged in January 2013 (originally published online in October 2012) suggested that the organic structures were indeed from the T. rex. Scientists performed molecular analyses of what they interpreted as osteocytes, or bone cells, from T. rex and another dinosaur, Brachylophosaurus canadensis. The hypothesis was tested by exposing the cell-like structures to an antibody that attacks a bird-osteocyte form of a protein known as PHEX. (The bird-osteocyte PHEX was used because birds evolved from dinosaurs.) The structures reacted similarly to the osteocytes from modern birds, which indicated that these were indeed dinosaur osteocytes. Later the structures were exposed to DNA-targeting antibodies that subsequently attached to matter inside the proposed cell membrane, which indicated the presence of DNA within it. Using mass spectrometry, the researchers also discovered in parts of the dinosaur bones amino acid sequences typical of proteins.

The ongoing debate over whether Tyrannosaurus was a predator or a scavenger had been driven by a lack of physical evidence to support either argument. In July 2013 a description of a Tyrannosaurus tooth embedded in a hadrosaur’s caudal vertebrae was positive evidence of predation by the large theropod. The tooth, which was taken from a hadrosaur from the Cretaceous Hell Creek Formation of South Dakota, was surrounded by healed bone growth, showing that the hadrosaur had survived the attack.

In January scientists described a very large (8.6-m [28.2-ft]-long) ichthyosaur, tentatively called Thalattoarchon saurophagis, that they determined represented the earliest marine tetrapod macropredator. Large macropredators that fed on animals of similar size did not occur when reptiles first returned to the oceans in the Late Paleozoic and Early Mesozoic. Thalattoarchon dated from the early Middle Triassic of Nevada and appeared approximately eight million years after the Permian extinction event (which killed more than 95% of marine and 70% of terrestrial species). The discovery suggested that biotic recovery occurred earlier in marine environments than in terrestrial environments, since land-based macropredators evolved later in the Triassic.

The discovery of two new sauropodomorphs from the Early Jurassic Hanson Formation in Antarctica was announced in 2012. With the previously described Glacialisaurus, this brought the total number of Early Jurassic Antarctic sauropodomorphs to three. Although the three represented new taxa not found on other continents, they were not closely related. A paper presented at the Geological Society of America conference in October 2013 made the claim that although there were dinosaurs that were endemic to Antarctica, no barriers existed that prevented faunal dispersal from other continents into Antarctica in the Early Jurassic.

Findings from an Early Jurassic bone bed in Lufeng county, Yunnan province, China (first described in April), shed new light on dinosaur embryonic development. Fossil dinosaur embryos are very rare and generally are found inside fossilized eggs. The Chinese embryos, probably belonging to the sauropodomorph Lufengosaurus, consisted of numerous disarticulated skeletons (skeletons separated at the joints) representing different stages of incubation—a factor that suggested that the embryos were from different nests. Comparisons between embryonic femurs of various sizes from this site indicated that the embryos developed rapidly, perhaps revealing that saurpods had short incubation times.

A study (reported in July) of 109 fossil skull domes from pachycephalosaurs found that 24 of the domes had lesions that had most likely resulted from the practice of head butting, which is a hypothesized form of social behaviour for this group of thick-skulled dinosaurs. The study indicated that the shape of the dome affected the placement of the injury on the skull. Lower domes had fewer injuries on the front portion of the skull than higher domes had. Researchers concluded that the lesions were very similar to those found on modern head-ramming mammals. Some paleontologists, however, argued that the domes were used not as rams but as distinctive species-specific identifiers or advertisements to attract members of the opposite sex.

In June a study provided a description of the only known preserved muscles from the jaw region of placoderms, the most-basal jawed vertebrates. It showed that placoderms had a jaw musculature that was radically different from that of living sharks. (Sharks were previously considered to have displayed features of the most primitive state for gnathostomes [jawed vertebrates]). The placoderm neck musculature apparently evolved with the dermal joint between the skull and the shoulder girdle, whereas the shark’s neck musculature evolved as part of a flexible neck.

During the early part of the Cenozoic Era, South America was an isolated continent, and toxodonts, large notoungulates that originated there, were common. The reconnection of North and South America resulted in the appearance in Central America and Mexico of a few toxodont specimens dating back to the Pleistocene. Until the present time, however, none had been found in the U.S. In January a single toxodont upper molar was reported from Pleistocene deposits in Harris county, Texas. This discovery extended the known range of toxodonts some 1,600 km (about 994 mi) farther north.

In May a description of two new fossil specimens from a 25.2-million-year-old rock layer in Tanzania’s Rukwa Rift pushed the known divergence of the apes from the Old World monkeys into the Oligocene, some five million years earlier than previous fossil evidence had indicated. One specimen, a partial mandible, was assigned to Rukwapithecus fleaglei, the oldest known ape. The other specimen, a third lower molar, was assigned to Nsungwepithecus gunnelli, the oldest known member of the Old World monkey lineage.

A nearly complete skeleton of a very small tarsier, which was discovered in China in 2002 and described in 2013, gave evidence that the anthropoid group of primates, which includes monkeys, apes, and humans, diverged from the tarsier group of primates at least 55 million years ago. The fossil was collected from lake deposits in eastern China and dated to between 54.8 million and 55.8 million years ago. Only teeth and jaw fragments of primates from this interval had been reported earlier.

A description of a well-preserved specimen of Australopithecus sediba from Malapa, South Africa, was released in April. It showed that although many aspects of its postcranial anatomy exhibited a combination of primitive features indicative of Australopithecus and more-advanced features indicative of Homo, the upper limbs of this specimen remained very primitive and indicated the retention of considerable climbing and suspensory ability.

In June a multinational group of scientists examining a hind toe bone discovered in the permafrost of Canada’s Yukon Territory announced the successful reconstruction of the genome of a 700,000-year-old horse. The reconstruction led to the conclusion that Equus—the genus containing contemporary horses, donkeys, and zebras—evolved some 4 million–4.5 million years ago. A few months later, scientists reported that they had reconstructed the mitochondrial DNA sequence of a cave bear from a bone fragment discovered at Sima de los Huesos (“Pit of the Bones”), a cave in Spain’s Atapuerca archaeological complex. The fragment was dated to more than 300,000 years ago, which made the genome among the oldest ever reconstructed from a specimen found outside a permafrost environment.

Life Sciences: Year In Review 2013
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