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Stem Cell Fraudster May Have Actually Made Breakthrough
Otter writes "Woo Suk Hwang's career swung from fame over his lab's claim of the first stem cells from a cloned human embryo to humiliation when the results were found to be fake. Research at Harvard on Hwang's cells has found that they are actually parthenogenic lines derived from eggs -- perhaps a more important and difficult achievement than what he had been claiming! 'Researchers said that the distinct "genetic fingerprint" of the stem cells means they may be the first in the world to be extracted from embryos produced by the so-called "virgin birth" method, or parthenogenesis. This happens when eggs are stimulated into becoming embryos without ever being fertilised by sperm, and has been achieved in animals. However, before Hwang, no one had managed to produce a human embryo using parthenogenesis which lived long enough to allow the extraction of viable stem cells.'"
Link to the paper. I submitted this as a story and didn't want to bomb Cell's servers if it hit the main page...
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
I managed to achieve cold fusion while cooking my breakfast in the microwave this morning.
You mean parthenogenic. It means conception of an egg into an embryo without the male sperm (or any other male fertilization).
Yes, in some species, this occurs in nature.
(See? We men aren't useful for much except for fixing cars and hauling around heavy objects.
Because it wasn't previously thought possible.
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The whole lying about the accomplishment aside, I've always said that even if you don't find what you're looking for, humanity is better off for knowing all the other ways of not accomplishing that task vs. no research done at all.
An I.T. motto in the hands of an idiot is a dangerous thing...
Stem Cell Fraudster May Have Actually Made Breakthrough
cl-0wned!
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
have egg on their face now?
Cruelest...Parents...Evar
What if the Hokey Pokey really is what it's all about?
Soon they will not need men to reproduce, and will begin eliminating us.
Then all those parallel parking spaces across the world will fall into disuse....wasted real estate....
A republic cannot succeed till it contains a certain body of men imbued with the principles of justice and honour.
Parthenogenesis is how they built that temple in Athens.
(See? We men aren't useful for much except for fixing cars and hauling around heavy objects. ;)
It's a standing joke between my Beloved and I.... "If only cucumbers could mow the grass...."
I hope it's a joke, at least.
Welcome to the Panopticon. Used to be a prison, now it's your home.
Jesus Christ! That's pretty amazing! To produce a male offspring by parthenogenesis, the mother would have to be a chimera formed between her and a fraternal twin, and somehow produced an egg from the male-chimeric half's cells, which then underwent parthenogenesis.
Now the probabilities are approaching miraculous.
Of course, that would mean that Jesus was genetically Mary's twin brother.
Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
Chimera? Are we talking about the upside-down head kind or the croco-lion-wolf kind?
Sorry. You say Chimera and I think FMA.
But seriously, that's a very interesting question. Would that I still had mod points for the day.
Um, no. When the Bible refers to "man", it means "mankind". Jesus was half-mankind, half-God. He still was tempted by the sinful nature of man (e.g. the devil tempting Jesus in the desert), but he was able to resist the temptation. So I'm afraid there's no theological dilemma looming here.
From the perspective of science, parthenogenesis has long been known to be a possible physical explanation for a real-life virgin birth. It's just that up until now, there has been no solid proof that it could happen in humans.
I've said it before and I'll say it again. You can find physical explanations for everything that happens in the universe. That's not the point. If you believe in God, then you must believe that it's his Universe that follows his Laws. Which means that everything that happens has an explanation inside the universe. The only question is, did it happen because an extra-universal God made it happen (some of these events have pretty freaky odds) or because it was simply a big coincidence? That's an answer that science can't provide (at least yet) and where theology comes into play.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
"Um. Yeah. Well... I planned that. It's a feature."
I am very small, utmostly microscopic.
best be glad she knows nothing of astroturf :P
"He" did have awfully long hair.
Badass Resumes
Disclaimer: I'm no scientist, and I only skimmed the paper, but I have an interest in genetics and an interest in seeing this better covered than the mass media is doing. Corrections most welcome.
I'm shooting for the non-geneticist version:
Basic Version:
a normal human cell has 2 copies of 22 non-sex chromosomes, and 2 sex chromosomes. The "copies" are almost certainly NOT identical to one another, but basically similar. These cells are "diploid" (having 2 of each chromosome) and are considered "somatic cells".
During normal reproduction, each person will contribute a "germline cell", an ova or a sperm, in which only 1 copy of each chromosome exists ("haploid"). These germline cells merge to create a "zygote" (which is diploid), which eventually becomes an embryo.
Parthenogenetic reproduction takes a germline cell, and duplicates the genetic material, making a diploid out of a haploid. Such replication happens with normal cells during the process of cell division ("mitosis"), so the real trick is (1) convincing the cell to do this duplication outside the cell division process and (2) convincing the cell that it is no longer a differentiated (specialized) cell, but instead a stem cell.
One interesting result here is that the parthenogenetic cell is NOT a clone of the parent cell - it will have two copies each of ONE of the copies of each chromosome from the parent, determined effectively at random. In some ways this means a parthenogenetic stem cell is less valuable than a cloned stem cell - it will not be a 100% match, though it will not contain any DNA foreign to the donor. In other ways it opens up all sorts of new areas of study.
One particular result is that it opens the opportunity for recessives to be studied. (Chromosomes have genes, each that code various proteins that run the bodies mechanics. Most people will therefore have two copies of every gene (having two copies of the chromosomes). Those genes may not be identical. Some genes only have their effects seen ("express") if there isn't another, different, copy of the gene present, and are called recessives. (blue eyes are a common example: A blue-eyed person has both genes as expressing "blue". Two blue eyed parents, having only the "blue" gene (hah!) to pass on to a child, will have a blue-eyed child (barring mutation). (Of course, the body is a big nasty mess of self-referencing code with lots of gotos, so examples tend to be oversimplified). Anyway, most recessives tend to be fairly rare in expressing, since any dominant gene will cover them up. Many recessives are bad. (Cystic Fibrosis is the most common example: 1 bad gene, okay. 2 bad genes: You die) A parthenogenetic process would allow for the study of recessives because you can take ova from a carrier (someone who has 1 copy of the bad gene), find one with the defective gene, put it through the parthenogenesis process, and bam, able to study the effects free of the presence of any other (different) copy of the gene.
Fun Fact: For 22 Chromosomes, people have two copies of most genes. Sex Chromosomes are not created equal. The X chromosome (every human has 1) has valuable and nifty genes. The Y chromosome (only in men) has very few genes (relatively). As a result, on Men X chromosomes express all recessives, and not on women. (The common example here is red-green colorblindness. Men with a defective gene are out of luck: Color-blind. Women with a defective gene get by if the other copy of the X chromosome has a functioning one. Result: Men are much more likely to be red-green color-blind.
Some papers a few months ago got some press for exploring the possible effects of this. (Men can serve as a "testing ground" for new mutations on the X chromosome, while women can serve as a judge of whether they are valuable without taking on the extra risk. Practiced through natural selection.)
Fun Fact #2: Women's cells don't just function with twice the number of X chromosomes though (We tend to react poorly to extra copies
I read Mary was mistranslated from a "young lady" to a "virgin", and that is the source of that entire silliness.