Search
Filter by Topic
- People (312) Apply People filter
- Reproduction (143) Apply Reproduction filter
- Publications (125) Apply Publications filter
- Experiments (93) Apply Experiments filter
- Legal (72) Apply Legal filter
- Theories (65) Apply Theories filter
- Technologies (60) Apply Technologies filter
- Processes (53) Apply Processes filter
- Disorders (37) Apply Disorders filter
- Organizations (36) Apply Organizations filter
- Ethics (30) Apply Ethics filter
- Outreach (26) Apply Outreach filter
- Religion (20) Apply Religion filter
- Organisms (8) Apply Organisms filter
- Reproductive Health Arizona (6) Apply Reproductive Health Arizona filter
- Places (4) Apply Places filter
- DNA (1) Apply DNA filter
- Publication (1) Apply Publication filter
- RHAZ (1) Apply RHAZ filter
Hanging Drop Tissue Culture
The hanging drop tissue culture is a technique utilized in embryology and other fields to allow growth that would otherwise be restricted by the flat plane of culture dishes and also to minimize the surface area to volume ratio, slowing evaporation. The classic hanging drop culture is a small drop of liquid, such as plasma or some other media allowing tissue growth, suspended from an inverted watch glass. The hanging drop is then suspended by gravity and surface tension, rather than spreading across a plate.
Format: Articles
Subject: Technologies
Trisomy 18 (Edwards Syndrome)
John Hilton Edwards first described the symptoms of the genetic disorder known as Trisomy 18 - one of the most common forms of trisomy, which occurs when cells have an extra copy of a chromosome, in humans - in 1960. Trisomy 18, also known as Edwards Syndrome, occurs approximately once per 6000 live births and is second in frequency only to Trisomy 21, or Down's Syndrome, as an autosomal trisomy. Trisomy 18 causes substantial developmental problems in utero.
Format: Articles
Subject: Disorders
The Biological Bulletin
From 1886 to 1889 Charles Otis Whitman was director of the Allis Lake Laboratory in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The lab was established by Edward Phelps Allis, Jr. to provide a place for biological research separate from a university setting and a place where an independent scholar like Allis himself could work. Allis had hired Whitman as an instructor to establish the lab, direct it, and lead a research program there. The lab lasted for eight years, attracted several researchers, and the papers that came out of the lab included a focus on embryology.
Format: Articles
Subject: Publications
"In vitro Experiments on the Effects of Mouse Sarcomas 180 and 37 on the Spinal and Sympathetic Ganglia of the Chick Embryo" (1954), by Rita Levi-Montalcini, Viktor Hamburger, and Hertha Meyer
"In vitro Experiments on the Effects of Mouse Sarcomas 180 and 37 on the Spinal and Sympathetic Ganglia of the Chick Embryo" were experiments conducted by Rita Levi-Montalcini in conjunction with Viktor Hamburger and Hertha Meyer and published in Cancer Research in 1954. In this series of experiments, conducted at the University of Brazil, Levi-Montalcini demonstrated increased nerve growth by introducing specific tumors (sarcomas) to chick ganglia. Ganglia are clusters of nerve cells, from which nerve fibers emerge.
Format: Articles
Subject: Experiments
"Versuche zur Analyse der Induktionsmittel in der Embryonalentwicklung" (1932), by Hermann Bautzmann, Johannes Holtfreter, Otto Mangold, and Hans Spemann
In "Versuche zur Analyse der Induktionsmittel in der Embryonalentwicklung," published in Naturwissenschaften in 1932, Hermann Bautzmann, Johannes Holtfreter, Otto Mangold, and Hans Spemann jointly reported on experiments each had conducted testing the activity of organizers killed by boiling, freezing, alcohol, and drying. Each of the authors had been independently conducting similar experiments, when Holtfreter made a breakthrough allowing him to produce many more successful transplantations.
Format: Articles
Subject: Experiments
Sperm Capacitation
Sperm capacitation refers to the physiological changes spermatozoa must undergo in order to have the ability to penetrate and fertilize an egg. This term was first coined in 1952 by Colin Russell Austin based on independent studies conducted by both Austin himself as well as Min Chueh Chang in 1951. Since the initial reports and emergence of the term, the details of the process have been more clearly elucidated due to technological advancements.
Format: Articles
Subject: Processes
"Genetic Control of Biochemical Reactions in Neurospora" (1941), by George W. Beadle and Edward L. Tatum
George Wells Beadle and Edward Lawrie Tatum's 1941 article Genetic Control of Biochemical Reactions in Neurospora detailed their experiments on how genes regulated chemical reactions, and how the chemical reactions in turn affected development in the organism. Beadle and Tatum experimented on Neurospora, a type of bread mold, and they concluded that mutations to genes affected the enzymes of organisms, a result that biologists later generalized to proteins, not just enzymes.
Format: Articles
Subject: Experiments
Angelman Syndrome
Angelman syndrome is a disorder in humans that causes neurological symptoms such as lack of speech, jerky movements, and insomnia. A human cell has two copies of twenty-three chromosomes for a total of forty-six-one copy from its mother and one from its father. But in the case of Angelman syndrome, the maternal chromosome numbered 15 has a mutation or deletion in its DNA and a gene on the paternal chromosome 15 is inactivated in some parts the brain. The result is the paternal gene is silenced during development of the sperm, which is called genetic imprinting.
Format: Articles
Subject: Disorders
Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA)
Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) is located outside the nucleus in the liquid portion of the cell (cytoplasm) inside cellular organelles called Mitochondria. Mitochondria are located in all complex or eukaryotic cells, including plant, animal, fungi, and single celled protists, which contain their own mtDNA genome. In animals with a backbone, or vertebrates, mtDNA is a double stranded, circular molecule that forms a circular genome, which ranges in size from sixteen to eighteen kilo-base pairs, depending on species. Each mitochondrion in a cell can have multiple copies of the mtDNA genome.
Format: Articles
Subject: Theories
Organisers and Genes (1940), by Conrad Hal Waddington
Conrad Hal Waddington's Organisers and Genes, published in 1940, is a summary of available research and theoretical framework for many concepts related to tissue differentiation in the developing embryo. The book is composed of two main conceptual sections. The first section explores the action and nature of the organizer, while the second section delves into genes and their influence on development.
Format: Articles
Subject: Publications
Tomorrow's Children (1934)
Tomorrow's Children is a film that tells the story of Alice Mason, a young woman whom the US government forcibly sterilizes because she comes from a family with a history of alcoholism, mental illnesses, and physical disabilities, traits that they considered biologically determined and inferior. The film, released in 1934, was directed by Crane Wilbur, produced by Bryan Foy, written by Wilbur and Wallace Thurman, and released by Foy Productions Ltd.
Format: Articles
Subject: Publications
Menstrual Tampon
Menstrual tampons are feminine hygiene devices, usually made of absorbent cotton, that are temporarily inserted into the vagina for absorbing a woman’s blood during menstruation. In 1931, Earl Haas invented the menstrual tampon most commonly used in the twenty-first century. Later, Gertrude Tendrich produced the first commercial tampon brand, Tampax, using Haas’s patented design. Tendrich and Haas’s tampon was made of tightly compacted absorbent cotton, shaped like a bullet, and had a string attached at the base that allowed for easy removal from the woman’s body.
Format: Articles
Subject: Technologies
Julia Barlow Platt's Embryological Observations on Salamanders' Cartilage (1893)
In 1893, Julia Barlow Platt published her research on the origins of cartilage in the developing head of the common mudpuppy (Necturus maculosus) embryo. The mudpuppy is an aquatic salamander commonly used by embryologists because its large embryonic cells and nuclei are easy to see. Platt followed the paths of cells in developing mudpuppy embryos to see how embryonic cells migrated during the formation of the head. With her research, Platt challenged then current theories about germ layers, the types of cells in an early embryo that develop into adult cells.
Format: Articles
Subject: Experiments, Theories, Processes
Trial of Madame Restell (Ann Lohman) for Abortion (1841)
In the spring of 1841, abortionist Ann Lohman, called Madame Restell, was convicted for crimes against one of her abortion clients, Maria Purdy. In a deathbed confession, Purdy admitted that she had received an abortion provided by Madame Restell, and she further claimed that the tuberculosis that she was dying from was a result of her abortion. Restell was charged with administering an illegal abortion in New York and her legal battles were heavily documented in the news.
Format: Articles
Subject: Theories
Zhang Lizhu (1921- )
Zhang Lizhu is a Chinese gynecologist and researcher. For most of her career, she worked in the Peking Medical College Third Hospital, renamed in 2000, Peking University Third Hospital. There, she led a team of researchers and physicians in the study of human in vitro fertilization (IVF) and embryo transfer (ET) technology. Zhang and her colleagues contributed to the birth of the first test-tube baby in Mainland China in 1988.
Format: Articles
Subject: People, Reproduction
"Sheep Cloned by Nuclear Transfer from a Cultured Cell Line" (1996), by Keith Campbell, Jim McWhir, William Ritchie, and Ian Wilmut
In 1995 and 1996, researchers at the Roslin Institute in Edinburgh, Scotland, cloned mammals for the first time. Keith Campbell, Jim McWhir, William Ritchie, and Ian Wilmut cloned two sheep, Megan and Morag, using sheep embryo cells. The experiments indicated how to reprogram nuclei from differentiated cells to produce live offspring, and that a single population of differentiated cells could produce multiple offspring. They reported their results in the article 'Sheep Cloned by Nuclear Transfer from a Cultured Cell Line' in March 1996.
Format: Articles
Subject: Experiments
Ooplasmic Transfer Technology
Ooplasmic transfer, also called cytoplasmic transfer, is an outside the body, in vitro fertilization (IVF) technique. Ooplasmic transfer in humans (Homo sapiens) is similar to in vitro fertilization (IVF), with a few additions. IVF is the process in which doctors manually combine an egg and sperm cells in a laboratory dish, as opposed to artificial insemination, which takes place in the female's body. For ooplasmic transfer, doctors withdraw cytoplasm from a donor's oocyte, and then they inject that cytoplasm with sperm into a patient's oocyte.
Format: Articles
Subject: Technologies
Social Implications of Non-Invasive Blood Tests to Determine the Sex of Fetuses
By 2011, researchers in the US had established that non-invasive blood tests can accurately determine the gender of a human fetus as early as seven weeks after fertilization. Experts predicted that this ability may encourage the use of prenatal sex screening tests by women interested to know the gender of their fetuses. As more people begin to use non-invasive blood tests that accurately determine the sex of the fetus at 7 weeks, many ethical questions pertaining to regulation, the consequences of gender-imbalanced societies, and altered meanings of the parent-child relationship.
Format: Articles
Subject: Reproduction, Ethics, Legal
Whitner v. South Carolina (1997)
In the case Whitner v. South Carolina in 1997, the South Carolina State Supreme Court defined the concept of a child to include viable fetuses. This allowed grounds for prosecution of a pregnant womanÕs prenatal activity if those activities endangered or could potentially endanger the fetus within her. The case brought the issue of fetal rights versus pregnant womenÕs rights to light.
Format: Articles
Subject: Legal, Reproduction
Genetics and IVF Institute, GIVF
In 1984, human genetics and reproduction researcher and physician Joseph D. Schulman founded the Genetics and IVF Institute, an international organization that provides infertility treatment and genetic services to patients. IVF stands for in vitro fertilization, an infertility treatment in which a female egg is fertilized by male sperm outside of the female body. GIVF is headquartered in Fairfax, Virginia, in association with Inova Health System, formerly called the Fairfax Hospital Association, one of the largest regional hospital systems in the United States.
Format: Articles
Subject: Organizations, Reproduction
Bellotti v. Baird (1979)
On 2 July 1979, the United States Supreme Court decided Bellotti v. Baird, ruling that a Massachusetts law that prohibited minors from obtaining abortions without parental consent was unconstitutional. That law prohibited minors from receiving abortions without permission from both of their parents or a superior court judge. Under that law, if one or both of the minor’s parents denied consent, the minor could petition a superior court judge who would determine whether the minor was competent enough to make the decision to abort on her own.
Format: Articles
Subject: Legal
Roe v. Wade (1973)
In the 1973 case of Roe v. Wade, the US Supreme Court ruled that laws banning abortion violated the US Constitution. The Texas abortion laws, articles 1191–1194, and 1196 of the Texas penal code, made abortion illegal and criminalized those who performed or facilitated the procedure. Prior to Roe v. Wade, most states heavily regulated or banned abortions. The US Supreme Court decision in Roe v. Wade secured women's rights to terminate pregnancies for any reasons within the first trimester of pregnancy.
Format: Articles
Subject: Legal, Reproduction
Margaret Higgins Sanger (1879-1966)
Margaret Higgins Sanger advocated for birth control in the United States and Europe during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Although people used contraceptives prior to the twentieth century, in the US the 1873 Comstock Act made the distribution of information relating to the use of contraceptives illegal, and similar state-level Comstock laws also classified discussion and dissemination of contraceptives as illegal.
Format: Articles
Subject: People, Reproductive Health Arizona, Reproduction, Outreach
Doe v. Bolton (1973)
In the 1973 court case Doe v. Bolton, the US Supreme Court in Washington, D.C., ruled that a Georgia law regulating abortion was unconstitutional. The Georgia abortion law required women seeking abortions to get approval for the procedure from their personal physician, two consulting physicians, and from a committee at the admitting hospital. Furthermore, under the statutes, only women who had been raped, whose lives were in danger from the pregnancy, or who were carrying fetuses likely to be seriously, permanently malformed were permitted to receive abortions.
Format: Articles
Subject: Legal, Reproduction