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 Sperm Cells Grown Outside the Body
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| Hypatia |
Posted on 03/23/2011 22:37
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  Posts: 2398 Joined: 08/04/2008 |
Sperm Stem Cells Are Grown Outside Body A male achievement that is perhaps insufficiently celebrated is that with every heartbeat a man generates 1,000 sperm, each of which has taken two months to produce. In a step that brings closer the possibility of making inheritable genetic changes in humans, scientists have succeeded in growing outside the body the special stem cells that direct the remarkably prolific process of sperm production. Advertisement Although the method now works just for mice, it may well apply to human cells, since they use the same genetic signals as mouse cells. Cultivation of the sperm production cells has been a 10-year goal of Dr. Ralph L. Brinster, a reproductive biologist at the University of Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine. The ability to culture the cells is a first step that leads in a number of possible directions. One is correcting the sperm of infertile men. Another, if ethically acceptable, would be genetic engineering in humans. A third is generating embryonic stem cells without the controversial step of making an embryo. The new method was developed by Dr. Brinster and his colleagues Hiroshi Kubota and Mary R. Avarbock and is reported in the current issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. http://www.nytime...sperm.html Edited by Hypatia on 03/24/2011 22:57 |
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| catman |
Posted on 03/24/2011 00:40
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 Posts: 3621 Joined: 08/03/2008 |
I'm completely in favor of generating embryonic stem cells. The other two, not so much.
"If I owned both Hell and Texas, I'd live in Hell and rent out Texas." - General Sheridan
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| Theory_Execution |
Posted on 03/24/2011 08:16
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Senior Member  Posts: 1478 Joined: 08/30/2008 |
Do we really need more people? |
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| catman |
Posted on 03/24/2011 14:27
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Posts: 3621 Joined: 08/03/2008 |
My thought exactly.
"If I owned both Hell and Texas, I'd live in Hell and rent out Texas." - General Sheridan
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| Bob of QF |
Posted on 03/25/2011 22:37
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 Senior Member Posts: 1791 Joined: 08/04/2008 |
This would be a real boon to lesbian couples who wanted to conceive children... .. or so I would imagine. 
Quantum Junction: Use both lanes
Reality is that which is left, after you stop believing. |
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| Hypatia |
Posted on 03/26/2011 01:24
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Posts: 2398 Joined: 08/04/2008 |
I'm all in favor of negative population growth. But I could still support something like this as a means of helping with infertility issues. I'm not so sure I'm crazy about the idea of human genetic engineering. |
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| catman |
Posted on 03/26/2011 03:58
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Posts: 3621 Joined: 08/03/2008 |
I had myself deactivated on 8/13/78 so I could do what I wanted with a clear conscience, knowing that I didn't want to activate anyone's egg. I think environment is more important than heredity in any case, so adoption was always an option if I had changed my mind about wanting a child.
"If I owned both Hell and Texas, I'd live in Hell and rent out Texas." - General Sheridan
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| Theory_Execution |
Posted on 03/26/2011 08:40
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Senior Member Posts: 1478 Joined: 08/30/2008 |
I agree catman, and if the adopted kid turns out to be a little shit, you can always fall back on the 'it ain't my seed' line haha. But seriously, adoption should be preferenced over efforts to battle infertility - its shocking how many kids there are without homes. |
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| catman |
Posted on 03/26/2011 14:02
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Posts: 3621 Joined: 08/03/2008 |
LOL! Did you ever see the 1950s movie The Bad Seed? I highly recommend it. I agree completely concerning adoption. There are far too many pompous asses who think that the world will be much poorer for it if they don't pass their precious genetic cargoes along. "If I owned both Hell and Texas, I'd live in Hell and rent out Texas." - General Sheridan
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| Theory_Execution |
Posted on 03/29/2011 07:54
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Senior Member Posts: 1478 Joined: 08/30/2008 |
I never did see it, im not a big horror movie fan - they tend to annoy me with the stupidity of the characters in them. When you knock the weapon out of the killers hands, and knock him/her down, dont run away! Pick up the weapon and go old school with some hacking and slashing, all disembowlement like - imagine the detective from the Sin City film, punching the head of the child rapist until theres just brain pulp and skull fragments - just like that. And the above is why I shouldnt have kids. |
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| Bob of QF |
Posted on 03/29/2011 10:25
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Senior Member Posts: 1791 Joined: 08/04/2008 |
catman wrote: LOL! Did you ever see the 1950s movie The Bad Seed? I highly recommend it. I agree completely concerning adoption. There are far too many pompous asses who think that the world will be much poorer for it if they don't pass their precious genetic cargoes along. Oh, most certainly! There is nothing at all special about a particular batch of DNA-- besides, with each generation, it gets reshuffled anyway. So even a genius will not likely pass on genius-hood to his brats. The trait seems to be too nebulous to be that simple anyway. As Heinlein put it: 'Nobody owns their genes. At best, you get to rent them for 60-80 years, then they go back to the gene pool.' (paraphrased from memory) Anyone who would exhibit an overwhelming preference for their own genetic seed over that of someone else's is just letting said DNA take the driver's seat. They've become just a medium by which their mindless DNA has reproduced itself. Okay, obviously, once a living kid is in the home of an adult, other factors come into play, and I can easily see >>that<<. I fully understand and have no beef with a parent putting his/her own children ahead of those of say, the neighbor's. No, I'm writing of the potentialities, here. How some folk are so hell-bent on their own 'precious' DNA to the exclusion of anything else in their lives, is obsessive-compulsive from where I sit. It's all a crap-shoot anyway: our technology is insufficient to determine if one baby will turn out to be Einstein or Gandhi, or instead, just another NASCAR pit-crew junkie. Until the kid is grown? No way to tell. One kid is a likely as the next, to be one or the other or something else entirely. I shudder to think what direction human culture will take, if we ever learn how to predict just from the DNA... I keep having these visions of an odd symbol... it has a bird, with a little 4-legged, angular thingy, kind of like a spinning propeller, only drawn as a stick-figure... and I keep seeing "gott mit uns" on people's belt buckles.... hmmmm. <snerk> Quantum Junction: Use both lanes
Reality is that which is left, after you stop believing. |
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| catman |
Posted on 03/29/2011 16:28
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Posts: 3621 Joined: 08/03/2008 |
Exactly! The genetic engineering thing is a scary subject for me too. I always think of a Three Stooges short in which two 'professors' are arguing, "Environment! Heredity!" back and forth, and upon seeing the Stooges, make a wager concerning whether or not they can be made into 'gentlemen' in three months. Lowbrow hilarity ensues. "If I owned both Hell and Texas, I'd live in Hell and rent out Texas." - General Sheridan
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