Andrew covers the biopharma industry, scientific research, and public health across the continent. You can reach Andrew confidentially on Signal at drewqjoseph.71.

LONDON — The use of an advanced genome-editing tool in early embryos pulled back the curtain on the role of one of the key genes that orchestrates the first stages of human development, scientists reported Thursday, a research endeavor that both focuses on a basic biological question and heightens the debate about whether such a tool could or should ever be used to make a baby. 

The new research, published in the journal Nature, underscored that next-generation genome-editing tools are more precise and less destructive than earlier forms of the revolutionary CRISPR technology, suggesting that embryonic DNA editing might in theory be used clinically one day, either to correct disease-causing mutations or, more thornily, to select for certain features or enhance certain traits. With the new study, scientists have also shown that an embryo can tolerate editing and still develop to the point whereby it could be implanted into a uterus.

Yet the researchers also reported that their use of so-called base editing didn’t result in consistent edits in every cell that made up the early embryos, creating a hodgepodge of altered and unaltered cells — a finding that echoed the results of a similar study reported earlier this month.