A team of scientists from Israel and the U.K. said they've succeeded in reverting adult cells into primordial human germ cells, a breakthrough that could help infertile couples conceive.

These reverted adult cells give rise to sperm and ova. Scientists say this is the first time human cells have been reverted to this early developmental stage.

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The achievement was announced by teams at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel and Cambridge University in the U.K.

Dr. Jacob Hanna of the Institute's Molecular Genetics Department who led the study said primordial germ cells are only the first step in a process that could one day result in making sperm and ova in test tubes.

Dr. Hanna believes this step is doable, and will theoretically mean women that have undergone chemotherapy or premature menopause will be able to conceive.

"Researchers have been attempting to create human primordial germ cells in the petri dish for years," he said.

Cellular differentiation begins when germ cells that give rise to sperm and ova are created. The process developed by the Israeli and British scientists subdued the genetic mechanism responsible for cellular differentiation.

Study lead author Naoko Irie from the University of Cambridge said scientists have recreated this early stage of development with stem cells with mice and rats but this is the first time human stem cells have been used.

Human primordial germ cells (PGCs) form during the early weeks of embryonic growth in which embryonic stem cells in the fertilized egg begin to differentiate from other human cells. When these primitive cells differentiate into sperm cells or ova, they will continue to do so as if on autopilot.

Researchers worked with naive human embryonic stem and pluripotent stem cells using a new method that reproduced cells identical to human PGCs.

The experiment showed that 40 percent of the stem cells turned into human sperm and ova, making this the first time scientists created a sperm and egg cell.

This study was published in the journal, Cell.

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