possibility of accidental or unintentional human insemination by
artificial means.
14th century AD: Accounts of Arab peoples using artificial
insemination on horses.
1777: Italian priest began experiments with artificial insemination of reptiles.
1785: First attempts at human artificial insemination by John Hunter -
a baby is born the same year.
1890: Robert Dickinson begins experimenting with donor sperm, although
his work is carried out in secret because of the condemnation of the
Church.
1945: Early reports of donor insemination published in the British
Medical Journal (BMJ).
1955: Four successful pregnancies using previously frozen sperm.
1960s: Big increase in knowledge of ovarian stimulants, how eggs
mature, ovulation, fertilisation and the growth of the embryo in
vitro, safer and better laparoscopy.
1969: Human fertilisation in vitro is achieved for the first time.
1977: First IVF pregnancy - but it is ectopic.
1978: Birth of Louise Brown, the first 'test tube' baby born as a result of IVF.
1980: Two Australian teams succeed in IVF deliveries after
drug-induced superovulation in the mother.
1988/9: GIFT introduced and the first successful pregnancies achieved.
1990: Human Fertility and Embryology Act in the UK and the setting up
of the Human Fertility and Embryology Authority.
1992: Rosanna della Corte gives birth to a son, Riccardo, at the age
of 62 after IVF treatment by Severino Antinori. First pregnancy as a
result of ICSI.
1997: The birth of Dolly the sheep, the first cloned mammal
2000: The culture of embryonic stem cells, some from 'spare' embryos
donated by couples who have had successful IVF treatment, opens the
way to 'made-to-order' tissue for transplant surgery.
2001: Teams in the US and Italy announce that they are working on
producing the first human clone.
2002: Severino Antinori, best known for his work in enabling
post-menopausal women to have babies, claims that three human cloned
pregnancies are taking place, two in Russia and one in 'an Islamic
country'.
2004: A controversial US fertility specialist who says he has
implanted a cloned embryo into a woman's womb has been condemned as
"irresponsible" by scientists. Dr Panos Zavos gave few details and no
evidence, and said it was still too early to tell if the procedure had
resulted in pregnancy
