Simple gene technique changes sex of a mouse
By Steve Connor,
The Independent
| 12. 11. 2009
From Minnie to Mickey (and all they did was turn off a gene)
The battle of the sexes is a never-ending war waged within ourselves
as male and female elements of our own bodies continually fight each
other for supremacy. This is the astonishing implication of a
pioneering study showing that it is possible to flick a genetic switch
that turns female ovary cells into male testicular tissue.
For
decades, the battle of the sexes has been accepted by biologists as a
real phenomenon with males and females competing against each other -
when their interests do not coincide - for the continued survival of
their genes in the next generation. Now scientists have been able to
show that a gender war is constantly raging between the genes and cells
of one individual.
One of the great dogmas of biology is that
gender is fixed from birth, determined by the inheritance of certain
genes on the X and Y sex chromosomes. But this simplistic idea has been
exploded by the latest study, which demonstrated that fully-developed
adult females can undergo a partial sex change following a genetic
modification to a single gene.
The...
Related Articles
By Vuyile Madwantsi, Independent Online | 08.22.2025
Imagine this: a future where parents could choose their baby’s eye colour, height or even intelligence.
Sounds like science fiction, right? But it’s closer than you think.
Let’s start with a simple, human truth: most of us want healthy children...
By Dennis Sponer, BioSpace | 09.03.2025
Imagine telling a child with sickle cell disease that a cure exists—but it’s too expensive for their insurer to cover. That’s not a hypothetical. It’s the reality of gene therapy today: a revolutionary medical breakthrough caught in the bottleneck of...
By Tia Ghose, Live Science | 09.16.2025
Twenty-six years ago today, on Sept. 17, a teenager who had received an experimental gene therapy died. His death led to needed changes in the clinical trial process while also spurring skepticism that would ultimately stall the field of gene...
By Roni Caryn Rabin, The New York Times | 08.25.2025
Scientists have dreamed for centuries about using animal organs to treat ailing humans. In recent years, those efforts have begun to bear fruit: Researchers have begun transplanting the hearts and kidneys of genetically modified pigs into patients, with varying degrees...