Men to become obsolete...?

[Cem]

Posted on Wed, Apr. 21, 2004

Mice created using 2 female eggs, no sperm

BY MARILYNN MARCHIONE AND SUSANNE QUICK

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel


MILWAUKEE - (KRT) - It still takes two, it's just that one doesn't have to be male.

Researchers created mice using two female eggs and no sperm - a first in mammals.

One of these fatherless mice grew up, mated with a male, and produced normal offspring, according to a report Thursday in the journal Nature.

But men shouldn't feel threatened or obsolete, experts say. That's because not only did it take many tries to make a mouse, but abnormal mice were created in the process and eggs had to be obtained from a newborn.

Because of this, said researchers, the technique would be unethical, impractical and maybe impossible in people.

"I can't see where anyone would want to do this in humans at all, or should," said Neal First, a biology professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the first scientist to clone cattle.

"I'm sure it will have social repercussions," predicted Larry Goldstein, a University of California, San Diego, biologist who heads the public policy committee of the American Society for Cell Biology.

"Those worried about anything other than normal reproduction . . . will point to this as another example of `Oh, gee, those scientists are out there doing weird stuff,' but I can't see where anybody ethically would want to try this. I doubt that it would work in humans," he said.

The work was done by researchers at Tokyo University of Agriculture in Japan and Seoul National University College of Medicine in Korea.

It involves parthenogenesis, stimulating an egg with chemicals and an electrical charge to make it divide and grow as it would do naturally if it had been fertilized by sperm.

Normal parthenotes, as the resulting embryos are called, aren't thought to be capable of developing into an organism. The impediment, it's believed, is something called imprinting - a process that determines which copy of each inherited gene (the mother's or the father's) is activated in the offspring.

The Japanese and Korean scientists got around this problem by using two eggs instead of one, and tricking one egg into accepting certain genes from the other instead of from a sperm.

The resulting embryo has genes from both eggs and therefore isn't a clone of one egg or the other.

But the work has lots of limitations, said scientists, including inefficiency.

They started with nearly 600 egg pairs. Three-fourths of them formed embryos, and 90 percent of these developed into blastocysts, a stage sufficient for implanting.

A total of 371 embryos were transferred to 26 female mice, and all but two became pregnant. The pregnancies yielded 10 live mice and 18 dead ones. Two of the 10 were genetically normal; the others showed signs of developmental problems and died shortly after birth.

One of the two normal mice was nursed by a foster mother. The female mouse grew into adulthood, mated normally and gave birth to eight live mouse pups.

The other normal parthenote was used for genetic studies.

"Biologically, it's fascinating. It tells us lots about how genes control embryonic development," Goldstein said. "It changes some ideas about why you need two parents to make a mammal."

But the problems with inefficiency and abnormal embryos are the same as those with cloning for reproductive purposes. This makes parthenogenesis similarly unethical for humans, said Rudolf Jaenisch, a researcher at the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research and at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

It also challenges what is known about the genes these scientists manipulated, which were not thought to be crucial to the embryo's development.

"This study raises a lot more questions than it provides answers," Jaenisch said.

Australian embryologists David Loebel and Patrick Tam expressed similar views in a commentary in Nature.

"It's amazing that altering the expression of just two imprinted genes can have a ripple effect on the rest of the genome," they wrote.

Debra Aronson, director of bioethics at the Biotechnology Industry Organization, which represents more than 1,000 research groups, said the science was exciting and should go forward, though not on people.

"It's a very exciting advance. It shows how fast the whole field is going," she said.

[Cem]

That's it! I'm taking dancing lessons...

[Brian Olewnick]

Mmmmmm....obsolesence.....

[Jazzzoline]

Did they try mixing spermatozoids from 2 different males?

[Dr Dave]

Men will never be obsolete. Without us, no romance.

[Gary Sisco]

Science catches up to radical feminism. Back in the daze, (I can't remember who right now) one wrote an essay advocating reducing the male portion of the population to 10%. My best friend and I (who were in tight with the sisters in those days, phew) used to ask each other after meeting a new guy whether he was a 10%'er or no. Not many were.

[tippy]

Forget radical feminism...telling me how to have a baby--or rather not--and what kind of sex to have. That's oppression too is it not?

LOL, Cem.

Dave, right on.

I wouldn't want the male population to ever drop below 25%.

[mke]

Originally Posted by Dr Dave

Men will never be obsolete. Without us, no romance.

Why is that?

Originally Posted by Tippy

I wouldn't want the male population to ever drop below 25%.

You're too kind.

[Dr Dave]

OK, I'll spot you romance. But who's going to reach the cake flour without a ladder?

[steve(thelil)]

I've been obsolete for almost as long as i've been a man.

Join the club.

[Dr Dave]

Nonsense. You've been on the cutting edge of Internet persona establishment for many years now.

[tippy]

Hell, we're almost all obsolete aren't we? Last week I realized (again) I'm completely obsolete, only here as a passive bystander to appreciate the fine works of others. The underside of nirvana...yet I'm still here. Go figure.

mke, I was very much joking.

Dave, the answer is...Make your own goddamn cake!

[Jazzzoline]

This news gives more sense to gay marriage.

[Gary Sisco]

Think of all the time women will save telling men where they might find their own socks.

[Darryl G. Thomas]

They can cut us down to 10%, just as long as I'm one of the last men standing.

Anyone remember that skit for "In Living Color". Tommy Davidson was the last straight man in San Francisco or somewhere.

[mke]

Originally Posted by tippy

mke, I was very much joking.

I know. Any serious figure would have been closer to 15%.

[tippy]

Truth is, it never occurred to me to reduce the male population. It's a stupid idea--insulting, graceless, destructive--if you ask me and if my quality of life is hindered by anyone, it's stupid ideas coming from the Stupid Population. I would assume that technology is near to eliminating either sex if they really wanted to. So I'm on the lookout for a gay Hitler or a Stalin she-devil--neither would have any fondness for me and my ways of thinking.

[Monte Smith]

Schnikey! Men obsolete? The male population reduced to ten percent? Does anyone know what this will do to my shares in inflatable rubber sex sheep?

[clinthopson]

Just think of the effect on Viagra sales.

[tippy]

Which reminds me of my "favorite" commercial. The smarmy Levitra ad. Soft-core porn--the guy's got a loosened tie and everything. I really don't need to see people carrying on above-the-waist as the result of a quality erection.

[tippy]

Originally Posted by Monte Smith

Schnikey! Men obsolete? The male population reduced to ten percent? Does anyone know what this will do to my shares in inflatable rubber sex sheep?

Howzabout marketing it as a pinata or a 3-D Pin The Tail in The Donkey...

[GoodSpeak]

Originally Posted by Dr Dave

Men will never be obsolete. Without us, no romance.

...no oil changes, no lawns mowed, no toilets repaired....no one to blame.

[GoodSpeak]

Shades of Brave New World...

[Jazzzoline]

Originally Posted by tippy

Howzabout marketing it as a pinata or a 3-D Pin The Tail in The Donkey...

But Tippy, those games are MEN's games too
*grins*

[tippy]

I suspect Monte's shares are going to be incorporated into the General Welfare anyway. Or at least bequeathed to Mrs. Monte. In any event, if we see this coming, I'm going to invest in Acme Turkey Basters Inc.

[mke]

Originally Posted by clinthopson

Just think of the effect on Viagra sales.

Imagine the effect on Viagra, and "better than Viagra," spam.

[Douglas]

From this it seems the boys are already on their knees begging

[mke]

Originally Posted by Douglas

From this it seems the boys are already on their knees begging

That could be a pocket-money-making opportunity...