{"id":3825,"date":"2012-03-19T15:39:36","date_gmt":"2012-03-19T04:39:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/scienceillustrated.com.au\/blog\/?p=3825"},"modified":"2012-03-29T08:16:12","modified_gmt":"2012-03-28T21:16:12","slug":"from-the-archives-test-tube-babies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/scienceillustrated.com.au\/blog\/science\/from-the-archives-test-tube-babies\/","title":{"rendered":"From the archives: Test-tube babies"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Artificial insemination. Image: Alex Mit\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

The first test-tube baby, Louise Joy Brown, was born in 1978.<\/strong><\/p>\n

In the 1950s scientific research was carried out to help couples conceive through artificial methods. Dr Robert G. Edwards (b. 1925) was a pioneer in the field; but it was until the mid-1970s, when Patrick Steptoe started working with him, that Edwards successfully fertilised an egg cell and implant it in the uterus.<\/p>\n

Lesley and John Brown visited Edwards in 1977. Edwards and his team collected egg cells from Lesley’s uterus. They placed them in a cell culture dish and then fertilised them with John’s sperm. A few days later, Edwards placed a healthy growing embryo in Lesley’s uterus. Nine months later, on July 25, 1978, at 11:74 pm, Louise Joy Brown was delivered by caesarean section in a hospital in Oldham, UK.<\/p>\n

Four years later her parents gave birth to a second test-tube baby, Natalie. On May 13, 1999, she became the first test-tube baby to give birth to a healthy child conceived naturally.<\/p>\n

After Louise’s birth, hospitals around the world started offering in vitro fertilisation. On June 23, 1980, Candice Elizabeth Reed was born at the Royal Women’s Hospital in Melbourne.<\/p>\n

Did you know”\u00a6<\/p>\n