Bird flu virus has been stopped from spreading in chicken cells grown in a lab through a gene-editing process created by scientists in Britain.

This breakthrough could help stop a human flu epidemic.

Researchers from Imperial College London and the University of Edinburgh’s Roslin Institute were able to stop the virus from reproducing as they edited out a section of chicken DNA inside the lab-grown cells.

“This is an important advance that suggests we may be able to use gene-editing techniques to produce chickens that are resistant to bird flu,” Mike McGrew of Roslin Institute, who co-led the research said in a statement, as he highlighted that the next step will aim at creating chickens with the same genetic change.

“We haven’t produced any birds yet and we need to check if the DNA change has any other effects on the bird cells before we can take this next step,” he added.