It is the first time a country has considered the DNA-altering technique in embryos and approved it.
The
research will take place at the Francis Crick Institute in London and
aims to provide a deeper understanding of the earliest moments of human
life.
It will be illegal for the scientists to implant the modified embryos into a woman.
But the field is attracting controversy over concerns it is opening the door to designer - or GM - babies.
DNA is the blueprint of life - the instructions for building the human body. Gene editing allows the precise manipulation of DNA.
In a world-first last year, scientists in China announced they had carried out gene editing in human embryos to correct a gene that causes a blood disorder.
Prof
Robin Lovell-Badge, a scientific advisor to the UK's fertility
regulator, told the BBC: "China has guidelines, but it is often unclear
exactly what they are until you've done it and stepped over an unclear
boundary.
"This is the first time it has gone through a properly regulatory system and been approved."
Groundbreaking
The experiments will take place in the first seven days after fertilisation.
During this time we go from a fertilised egg to a structure called a blastocyst, containing 200-300 cells.
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