UK scientists develop 'his-and-hers' fertility test kit
... as an indicator of ovarian reserve (the number of eggs in the ovary). The prototypes of the two tests have already been tested on 118 men and 243 women and Genosis are currently scaling up production for clinical trials in the UK and the USA during the autumn. The kit should be available over the counter...Unleashing GMO's into the environment
...ge at which they sexually mature and the number of eggs females produce. Then they developed a computer model based on these six traits that predicts how any modified strain would fare against the wild-type fish. The researchers applied their model to a strain of Japanese ricefish, or medaka, to which...Study shows top predator makes prey population vulnerable in catastrophe
...t on the island were swept away or drowned, lizard eggs must have been able to survive the hurricane and g...on't think anyone would have predicted that lizard eggs could survive immersion in saltwater for six hours," says Losos, who has duplicated the salty condit...New study tightens the link between smoking and early menopause
...gers the expression of a gene called Bax within an eggs nucleus. The elevated level of Bax then initiates.... Using mouse models, Tillys team also found that eggs with inactivated Ahr or Bax genes were resistant to PAH-induced death, indicating the functional imp...Exploding eggs and rare human disorder help explain water regulation
...in frogs' eggs, the scientists discovered that the eggs exploded when immersed in water because they absorbed the liquid much faster than normal. Agre named the protein aquaporin because it acted as a pore or water channel through which fluids flow in and out of the membrane. Since the exploding frog egg......s have announced that they are obtaining sperm and eggs from human volunteers to produce embryos for the purpose of creating stem cells. Undoubtedly, other companies are doing the same but are not announcing their work. If an NIH-and FDA- certified source of embryonic stem cells were available and became ...Fish-stocking may spread amphibian disease
...from a fish hatchery and freshly-laid western toad eggs from Lost Lake, Oregon. Western toads have declined severely since the late 1980s, and up to 90% of the toad embryos have died at sites with Saprolegnia outbreaks. Laboratory experiments confirmed that trout can spread the fungus to toad embryos: ex...Of gallflies, bees, mosquitoes, and butterflies: researchers to discuss insects
.... Culiseta, the researchers found, avoids laying eggs in pools which contain the Notonecta; the mosquito is able to pick up on chemical cues given off by the predator. Blaustein and his colleagues will now begin assessing how these same chemicals might be applied to other mosquito breeding sites in or......ography Division at Scripps. "Rather, half as many eggs will survive. We believe the reason is cannibalism and we think its a self-regulating mechanism that no one has found before in the open sea." Copepods, tiny marine crustaceans (about four Calanus finmarchicus fit end to end on a dime), are the mos...Fire ant queens and workers negotiate truce' on colony sex ratio
...tio of her colony by limiting the number of female eggs she lays. "The queen and the workers are having a ...en." The researchers next examined the sex of the eggs produced by seven male- and 10 female-specialist colonies. They found that the queens from the femal...Trouble in paradise? 'Natural' pest control requires careful planning, Science authors conclude
... the plants. Parasitoids, such as alien wasps, lay eggs on the bodies of Lepidoptera caterpillars, causing an early death before the parasite larvae metamorphose into winged insects. Researchers wanted to map out exactly who eats what, to keep track of the real impact of non-native species on the Hawaii...SUNY chemist wins national award for fertility research
...ed fertilin-beta, would seek and latch onto at the eggs surface. Sampson and her group used a technique called photoaffinity labeling to tag and track the surface proteins. They also made small molecules to block various pieces of the binding complex and thus study the pieces one at a time. She said, We n...Radio waves stop marine pests dead in their tracks
...ies of freshwater mussels. Zebra mussels lay their eggs near intake pipes of electric generating stations. Their dust-sized larvae attach to the interior of the pipes, then grow to approximately the size of a lima bean, clogging the pipes to the point that theyre unusable. Zebra mussels immigrated to the...Age of menopause dictated largely by genes
...,10 and 6 years respectively. A woman's store of eggs declines throughout her life. When stores are exha... same factors that determine the rate at which the eggs decrease. This means that the woman destined to have an early menopause is also likely to be destin...Invasive gobies prevent sculpin spawning, impacting perch food chain
...ce area because unlike the sculpin, they lay their eggs in a single layer, said Janssen. "It may be possible to discourage goby breeding by removing larger rocks from areas that are prime spawning sites. "We can also create artificial spawning shelters for the sculpins that would be too small for the gob...Cell-cell communication in the flower is unlocked
...lants. Like humans and animal species, plants use eggs and sperm in order to make seed and multiply. On ...s pistil and into the plant's ovaries. Fertilized eggs then develop into seed ready to be grown in a garden or a producer's field. However, if "self-relat...From embryo to placenta, gene transfer in primates a success
...erting a gene from a jellyfish into the fertilized eggs of rhesus monkeys, scientists have managed to make transgenic placentas, placentas where the inserted gene functions as it does in the jellyfish. Writing today, Sept. 11, in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Thaddeus G. Golos of th...DNA transcription is tuned to specific cells
...at are part of the follicle surrounding developing eggs in the ovaries. "While that work nailed down the physiological defect in the knockout mice, we really wanted to know which genes TAFII105 was involved in regulating," said Tjian. To do that, Tjian and his colleagues isolated mRNA from both wild-type ...Parasite offers natural way to control leaf-eating slugs
... worms emerge. Adults also lay eggs in the host's corpse, producing another generation of larvae that will infect other slugs. The worm of interest is known as a nematode, Phasmarhabditis hermaphrodita. Before it can be used ......ese insects (two butterflies and a moth) lay their eggs only on a buckwheat characteristic of this habitat. Rubinoff found that the California gnatcatcher occurred in nearly all of the patches. However, this was not true for the three insects studied. One of the butterflies (Apodemia mormo) occurred in f...