Jan 3rd 2012 Who's Your Daddy?

[Nirvana]

Scientists grow sperm in laboratory dish


Scientists have made a major breakthrough that could soon see human sperm grown in the laboratory.




The development opens up the possibility of infertile men being able to father their own children rather than using donor sperm.

Researchers in Germany and Israel were able to grow mouse sperm from a few cells in a laboratory dish.

In a world first a team headed by Professor Stefan Schlatt, at Muenster University in Germany, were able to grow sperm by using germ cells. These are the cells in testicles that are responsible for sperm production.

Scientists grew the sperm by surrounding the germ cells in a special compound called agar jelly to create an environment similar to that found in testicles.

Prof. Mahmoud Huleihel, who also grew the sperm at Israel's Ben Gurion University in Beersheba, said: "I believe it will eventually be possible to routinely grow human male sperm to order by extracting tissue containing germ cells from a man's testicle and stimulating sperm production in the laboratory."

LINK

[Sheldonrs]

I prefer mine on tap from the meat tube, not the test tube.

[CaliforniaMama]

I can see it all now, instead of internet dating, it will be internet breeding.

You join a breeding service and choose the qualities you want in your child's sperm donation. You buy the sperm, have it invitroed, test tubed, or whatever, and grow your baby by design.

It can even work the other way round using surrogate moms. Dads can search for the qualities they want in their egg donation, have it do the dance with his sperm, have the surrogate grow the baby and voila, he has the child of his own making.

Won't that be wonderful?

[glatt]

"The main thing that would have to be proved is that the sperm was not genetically damaged and was the same as sperm produced in the testes. Similar checks are already carried out on eggs and embryos used in women's fertility treatment."

Very interesting. I guess germ cells are like baby sperm. So they are getting naturally occurring germ cells and just incubating them so they can turn into sperm.

I was thinking they were making some sort of artificial sperm or cloned sperm, and that kind of defeats the whole point, since you want a lot of diversity between all the little swimmers so only the strongest and fastest ones survive. But using this method, they are getting the same sperm that would come out anyway if everything was working correctly. Pretty cool.

[footfootfoot]

This can only be good news.

[HungLikeJesus]

That should help solve the world's underpopulation problem.

[infinite monkey]

Originally Posted by HungLikeJesus

That should help solve the world's underpopulation problem.

I wuv oo!

[Pete Zicato]

Two bits of trivia for you:

1) Zing #2 goes to Indiana University at Bloomington. I have a red T shirt with the logo "Hoosier Daddy".

2) I heard this on NPR while on Christmas vacation. The first media use of the phrase "Who's your Daddy?" was in "Time of the Season" by the Zombies.

[infinite monkey]

3) Bloomington was where they filmed one of the best little sleeper films of all time: Breaking Away.

[Pete Zicato]

Originally Posted by infinite monkey

3) Bloomington was where they filmed one of the best little sleeper films of all time: Breaking Away.

As IU will remind you repeatedly.

[HungLikeJesus]

I've got that in my queue. Is it good?

[Lamplighter]

Dave: Buon giorno, papa!
Dad: I'm not "papa." I'm your god-damned father.

[infinite monkey]

I saw it with a bunch of guys and girls. Everytime we were together after that I remember Scott B saying "REFUND? REFUND?"

It's really great, HLJ.

"Well, we're a little disturbed by developments in the Middle East, but...""

[SPUCK]

Wait a minute.. Isn't this going to select for males without the ability to um.. do their own work?

Ahh I see. Once there are only a few males that can 'git er done' they will switch to government allotted sperm generation.

"I'm sorry sir you've been de-selected because of.... yes, a parking ticket back on April 3rd. So sorry for you... NEXT!"

[Degrees]

I know a guy who got German Measles as a kid and in now infertile. This would let him and his wife finally have kids.