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Displaying 1051 - 1060 of 1179 items.

The Comstock Law (1873)

By Sheraden Seward

The Comstock Law was a controversial law because it limited the reproductive rights of women and violated every person's right to privacy. This federal law was the beginning of a long fight over the reproductive rights of women which is still being waged. Reproductive rights are important to embryology because they lead to the discussions regarding the morality of abortion, contraceptives, and ultimately the moral status of the embryo.

Format: Articles

Subject: Legal, Reproduction

"Formation of Genetically Mosaic Mouse Embryos and Early Development of Lethal (t12/t12)-Normal Mosaics" (1964), by Beatrice Mintz

By Adam R. Navis

The paper "Formation of Genetically Mosaic Mouse Embryos and Early Development of Lethal (t12/t12)-Normal Mosaics," by Beatrice Mintz, describes a technique to fuse two mouse embryos into a single embryo. This work was published in the Journal of Experimental Zoology in 1964. When two embryos are correctly joined before the 32-cell stage, the embryo will develop normally and exhibit a mosaic pattern of cells as an adult.

Format: Articles

Subject: Experiments

Test-Tube Baby

By Stephen C. Ruffenach

A test-tube baby is the product of a successful human reproduction that results from methods beyond sexual intercourse between a man and a woman and instead utilizes medical intervention that manipulates both the egg and sperm cells for successful fertilization. The term was originally used to refer to the babies born from the earliest applications of artificial insemination and has now been expanded to refer to children born through the use of in vitro fertilization, the practice of fertilizing an embryo outside of a woman's body.

Format: Articles

Subject: Processes, Ethics, Reproduction

Eisenstadt v. Baird (1972)

By Sheraden Seward

Prior to 1971, women had some difficulty obtaining contraceptive materials due to a law prohibiting the distribution of contraceptives by anyone other than a registered physician or registered pharmacist. This limited access to contraceptives had an impact on women's reproductive rights and it was the Supreme Court case Eisenstadt v. Baird (1972) that helped bring the issue into the public spotlight. It demonstrated that women's bodies have reproductive as well as anatomical functions, and that the right to privacy extends to those reproductive functions.

Format: Articles

Subject: Legal, Reproduction

Gregory Goodwin Pincus (1903-1967)

By Aliya Buttar

Gregory Goodwin Pincus, one of the original researchers responsible for the development of the first oral contraceptive pill, was born in Woodbine, New Jersey, on 19 April 1903 to Russian Jewish parents. In 1924 Pincus received his BS degree from Cornell University, and in 1927 he received his MS and PhD from Harvard University, having studied under William Ernest Castle and William John Crozier.

Format: Articles

Subject: People, Reproduction

Progestin: Synthetic Progesterone

By Aliya Butler, Seward Sheraden

Progestin is a synthetic form of progesterone, a naturally occurring hormone, which plays an important role in the female reproductive cycle. During the 1950s two types of progestin that were later used in birth control pills were created, norethindrone and norethynodrel. In 1951 Carl Djerassi developed norethindrone at Syntex, S.A. laboratories located in Mexico City, receiving a patent on 1 May 1956. In 1953 Frank Colton developed norethynodrel at G.D. Searle and Company laboratories located in Chicago, receiving a patent on 29 November 1955.

Format: Articles

Subject: Technologies, Reproduction

The Marine Biological Laboratory-Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Library

By Jane Maienschein

In 1888 when students and investigators arrived in Woods Hole for the inaugural session of the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL), they recognized the need for a library collection of books and journals. The one wooden building on campus, later known as Old Main, housed everything, with researchers upstairs and the student laboratory downstairs. Lectures were held in one corner, and shelves held what books and journals were contributed.

Format: Articles

Subject: Organizations

Jane Maienschein (1950- )

By EP Editorial Team

Jane Maienschein is the daughter of Joyce Kylander and Fred Maienschein, and was born in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, on 23 September 1950. She attended MIT as a freshman and then transferred to Yale University in 1969 when Yale decided to admit women undergraduates. In 1972 she graduated with an honors degree in History, the Arts, and Letters having written a thesis on the history of science. She then attended Indiana University and studied with historian of embryology Frederick B.

Format: Articles

Subject: People

Arizona State University Embryo Project Photograph Collections

By Jane Maienschein

In the 1970s Stanford University Embryologist Harold Heath sent a box of photographs to Frederick B. Churchill, who was a Professor in the History and Philosophy of Science Department at Indiana University. Heath was born in Indiana, he knew that Churchill was the leading historian of embryology, and he wanted his photographs to be used and therefore wanted them to be housed somewhere with an interest in the history of biology. Heath made it clear that he was donating the photographs for use by scholars and the public.

Format: Articles

Subject: Outreach

Biological Lectures Delivered at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole

By EP Editorial Team

The Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, Massachusetts, began in 1888 with one building housing researchers upstairs and students in a shared lab and lecture space downstairs. For the first two years, instruction took the form of general lectures covering a range of topics in zoology. In addition, the trustees offered some public lectures in Boston to raise funds for the lab.

Format: Articles

Subject: Organizations, Outreach