Epigenetics of the mammalian germline - by Metacelsus

The year was 1984, and scientists were wondering: why is sperm, and not just eggs, necessary to make a baby mouse? In non-mammalian species (notably several reptiles), unfertilized eggs can activate as if they were fertilized, copy their genomes, and produce viable offspring. This process is known as parthenogenesis, and scientists could induce it experimentally in mouse eggs, with one research group even reporting live offspring. But as other researchers tried it, it became clear that although parthenogenetic embryos developed to the blastocyst stage, they did not successfully grow to term, and in particular showed defects in the extra-embryonic tissues such as the placenta. Three labs, led by Azim Surani at Cambridge, Davor Solter at the Wistar Institute, and Robin Lovell-Badge at University College London, were hard at work trying to understand why. One hypothesis was that there was some necessary component missing from the egg cytoplasm which the sperm provided. But this was quickl

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• Elijah Bodden