No men OR women needed

[Dirttyrabbit Profile]

28th October 2009
No men OR women needed
Scientists create sperm and eggs from stem cells

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/ ... -time.html

Human eggs and sperm have been grown in the laboratory in research which could change the face of parenthood.
It paves the way for a cure for infertility and could help those left sterile by cancer treatment to have children who are biologically their own.

But it raises a number of moral and ethical concerns. These include the possibility of children being born through entirely artificial means, and men and women being sidelined from the process of making babies.
Opponents argue that it is wrong to meddle with the building blocks of life and warn that the advances taking place to tackle infertility risk distorting and damaging relations between family members.

The U.S. government-funded research also offers the prospect of a 'miracle pill' which staves off the menopause, allowing women to wait longer to have a child.
It centres on stem cells, widely seen as a repair kit for the body.
Scientists at Stanford University in California found the right cocktail of chemicals and vitamins to coax the cells into becoming eggs and sperm.
The sperm had heads and short tails and are thought to have been mature enough to fertilise an egg.
The eggs were at a much earlier stage but were still much more developed than any created so far by other scientists.






Britain OKs Hybrid Human Cloning Combining Animal and Human DNA
http://www.lifenews.com/bio2447.html
May 19, 2008
London, England (LifeNews.com) -- Members of the British Parliament, on a lopsided vote, approved allowing scientists to make hybrids combining animal and human DNA in human cloning attempts. The House of Commons rejected an amendment to the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill that would have prevented it.
MPs voted 336 to 176 against the amendment from Tory former minister Edward Leigh.
He said the use of hybrid clones cross an "entirely new ethical boundary," and turn the UK into a scientific "rogue state."
"In many ways we are like children playing with landmines without any concept of the dangers of the technology that we are handling," he said, according to a Press Association report.
Members of parliament also voted 286 to 223 to reject a second amendment that would have prohibited so-called "true hybrids" using the sex cells of a human and an animal.
Any human embryos created with human and animal DNA would be killed 14 days after their creation. Scientists say they want to engage in human cloning to obtain more embryonic stem cells for research even though they've never helped patients with diseases.
The votes are the first in a series of votes on amendment to the bioethics bill and others will likely try to limit late-term abortions, allow just one doctor to sign off on abortions and deal with other issues like in-vitro fertilization.
Before the vote, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown passionately defended the bill.
"I believe that we owe it to ourselves and future generations to introduce these measures and in particular to give our unequivocal backing, within the right framework of rules and standards, to stem cell research," he wrote.

[Dirttyrabbit Profile]

Pickled Alien Jar

Sea monkeys and goldfish are so last century. These days, people are more likely to be keeping pickled aliens in a jar. It appears to be dead or fake, but you never know. It's a freaking alien for dodge sake. Who said it needs oxygen or a heartbeat to survive?

[TheDuck Profile]

Kaned.