Infertility is a problem that many people suffer with, and it can be truly heartbreaking to say the least.
While there are many options available currently (including IVF, surrogacy and adoption) available, new breakthroughs in the world of infertility treatments are always welcomed.
And the latest one has got the medical world pretty excited.
Because scientists in China have revealed that they’ve successfully grown sperm within a lab that they assure can fertilize an egg, producing healthy and functioning offspring.
Although the little guys cant swim just yet, its still a major move forward in treating infertility.
By recreating the environment of the testicles in a dish, scientists were able to convert stem cells (the wonder cells that have the ability to morph into different cell types within the body) into primitive sperm cells, which in turn developed into functioning sperm.
It is said to be a huge step in treatments, and could potentially help men with damaged fertility, for example those who’ve undergone cancer treatment, produce sperm once more.
Co-senior study author Jiahao Sha of Nanjing Medical University said:
"If proven to be safe and effective in humans, our platform could potentially generate fully functional sperm for artificial insemination or in vitro fertilization techniques.
"Because currently available treatments do not work for many couples, we hope that our approach could substantially improve success rates for male infertility."
Speaking to the BBC, Professor Robin Lovell-Badge, from the UK's Francis Crick Institute praised the work, and said:
"I expect many think it is easy to make sperm, most men just sit there and make millions of the little blighters every hour. However, as this paper clearly shows, it is much more complex than this."
Up to 15 per cent of couples suffer with fertility issues, with one third of the being an issue with the sperm.