Yesterday The Telegraph broke news that researchers in Britain have have created sperm cells from a female embryo for the first time.
Led by Karim Nayernia, Professor of Stem Cell Biology, the scientists at the University of Newcastle have “coaxed” female embryonic stem cells into primitive sperm cells. If the team receives permission, they plan next to develop the method to use female bone marrow cells (which probably will be called getting “a boner”).
As Emily Singer of the MIT Technology Review blogs, “Use that sperm to fertilize an egg, and voila: children with two female biological parents.”
If this method of reproduction ever became widely used, there would be fewer and fewer men. The absence of a Y-chromosome in the female sperm makes it impossible to create males. With each successive generation, there would be fewer men in the reproduction pool.
Now this research is likely years away from being finished, but could this be the beginning of the end of males? What would the world be like without the human male?
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at the Uffizi in Florence.
great little essay, caveman. i can see why this would catch your attention.
We can still lift heavy stuff and kill spiders….we’re not ready for extinction yet!
did you ever see that movie Queen of Outer Space… i’m pretty sure that’s close to what it would be like.
i like men. and my nephews. and my dad. even my brothers-in-law are okay. and what would i do without my dutchman?
Unless we want to go the way of the banana. Which is going away.