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Human Sperm Produced In the Laboratory

duh P3rf3ss3r writes "The BBC is carrying a report from a team of researchers at Newcastle University who claim to have developed a the first 'artificial' human sperm from stem cells. The research, reported in the journal Stem Cells and Development, involved selecting meristematic germ cells from a human embryonic stem cell culture and inducing meiosis, thus producing a haploid gamete. The authors claim that the resulting sperm are fully formed, mature, human sperm cells but the announcement has been greeted with mixed reaction from colleagues who claim the procedure is ethically questionable and that the gametes produced are of inferior levels of maturation."

10 of 368 comments (clear)

  1. Mandatory... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I for one, welcome our female overlords. I hope they find me useful and will not use me for food.

  2. Re:I can't believe it's not butter! by alexborges · · Score: 3, Insightful

    If it has the DNA, its human.

    Thats the ONLY THING that ENCODES humanity....

    Food for thought, thats all Im saying.

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    NO SIG
  3. Re:Well... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Spend some time around some militant feminists. Yes, yes you do.

  4. Re:Sperm Shortage? by f8l_0e · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Consider a man a wife. The husband is infertile for reasons other than motility. They could now have a child with sperm produced from his stem cells.

  5. One implication by Arthur+B. · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Interestingly, this opens the door to biological children from homosexuals couple. Sure it's been foreseen for a long time, still big big can of worm.

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    \u262D = \u5350
    1. Re:One implication by thesandtiger · · Score: 3, Insightful

      How is it any more a "big can of worm" than infertile hetero couples having children? Are you suggesting that there is some kind of ethical or moral problem with homosexuals having children with this tech that would not apply to heterosexual couples?

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      Since I can't tell them apart, I treat all ACs as the same person.
  6. Re:So what? by cashman73 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Or, 3. if they took stem cells from a lesbian, they could generate some sperm for her, thereby along her to impregnate her other female partner. Next, all they need to do is to generate an egg cell from a homosexual male stem cell. Then, once same-sex couples can successfully reproduce, the religious right is going to go apeshit and all hell is going to break loose! ;-)

  7. Re:So what? by Thiez · · Score: 3, Insightful

    You wouldn't want to do that though, since this would basically be incest++. If we ever get the tech to make impregnating yourself with yourself possible, it'll probably get banned because it'd lead to a higher chance of birth defects.

  8. Re:So what? by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Why would you pay to manufacture slave babies when you could just let the poor do it for you? They've been doing a fine job, even against their own economic interests, for centuries now.

  9. Re:Moral issues? by Hurricane78 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Well, actually "natural" means "millions if not billions of years of testing in the field, resulting in an unbeatable guaranteed fitness". Of course you could have luck and come up with something better. But it is highly unlikely. And you most likely would forget all kinds of little cycles in nature that are needed to keep things working in the long term.

    Wait for the second, third or fourth generation showing all kinds of problems, up to being unable to create the next generation at all.

    It's way more complicated than you can imagine. We got the tools, but we do not have the brains to use them properly. That is my standpoint. :)

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    Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.