Base editing reveals essential role for NANOG in human embryogenesis published in Nature

Base editing reveals an essential role for NANOG in human embryogenesis, according to research published in Nature on 25 June 2026. Researchers applied adenine base editing using ABE8e to target an exon splice donor site in donated human embryos. This created a splicing defect and functional knockout of the NANOG gene, marking the first application of base editing to study a developmental regulator in human embryos. The method did not trigger genotoxicity and showed limited off-target editing. Loss of NANOG disrupted pluripotent epiblast specification. Instead, cells differentiated toward a primitive endoderm transcriptional programme associated with the yolk sac or a trophectoderm programme associated with the placenta. Retention of primitive endoderm differentiation in the edited human embryos indicated a functional compensation distinct from that observed in mouse models. The findings demonstrate an essential role for NANOG in human pluripotency and epiblast specification. Corresponding authors are Katarina Harasimov and Kathy K. Niakan.