Embryo Splitting

Embryo splitting naturally occurs in identical twins. Man made embryo splitting was used for the first time on human embryos in 1992, when investigators divided seventeen chromosomally abnormal human embryos (which they therefore would not have implanted in a woman, so which were not going to survive). From these embryos, they obtained a total of forty-eight developing embryos in vitro(73). There is no evidence that embryo splitting in the human has ever been used or that it would be effective if it were so used to increase the success rate of IVF because of the pattern of early development of the human embryo.