Here’s a news that would have made it to the Maury Show. Actor Jude Law (36) wanted to get a DNA test to make sure that he is the father of the baby that girlfriend Samantha Burke (24) is carrying. Burke and Law had a summer fling while he was working on the movie “Sherlock Holmes”, and when she became pregnant, Law wanted a DNA test on the unborn child.

So I guess Jude Law isn’t sure he’s the father? Oh well, that’s not my business. One usually wants to establish paternity (among other things) because it settles legal and social …read more

Do you remember that TV ad for a weed-killer where two men face each other at their front lawns (ala-fastest draw in the west)? Well, that scene was brought to mind when I read this report on atrazine, a popular weed-killer in the U.S..
As one of the most widely used herbicides in the U.S., atrazine easily runs off into surrounding fields and groundwater. It is banned in Europe because the concentrations of the herbicide in underground water supply systems can not be contained at safe levels.
Recently, a study reported that atrazine lowers the production of the male hormone …read more

Public health officials have always recommended that pregnant women should avoid exposure to the influenza virus because of complications of infection, including spontaneous abortion, pre-term labor and fetal defects. And that goes for any type of flu virus, be it the seasonal type or the pandemic H1N1 swine flu. Unfortunately, very few percentage of pregnant women get vaccinated and very few OB/GYN doctors recommend the vaccine.
But recent studies may take that warning to another level if results were to prove true for humans.
Neuroscientists found that the H1N1 changes the genes that control brain growth and development in the unborn child, …read more

The promise of producing “any” type of cells or tissues from stem cells has taken yet another interesting, and controversial result. British researchers claimed to have created sperms using stem cells!
Professor Karim Nayernia at Newcastle University and the NorthEast England Stem Cell Institute (NESCI) used donated human embryos to create stem cells. The stem cells were then placed in a chemical brew that enabled them to develop into “germline” stem cells. The XT stem cells were then allowed to develop into mature sperm cells, which have heads, tails and move. (Watch this grainy video.)
The scientists hope the technology …read more

The elementary concept is that the father’s role in making babies is to only contribute the sperm, and the mother does all the work. That after fertilization, the development of the resulting embryo is at the mercy of the mother’s egg cytoplasm that received it.
Well, recent studies show that dad’s sperm contains a set of instructions that make certain the embryo develops properly, and specifically that his genes get turned on at the right time.
But let’s do a short tutorial first…
Each chromosome is really just a single long DNA molecule, that can stretch out to an …read more

It’s said that in our generation,  little girls have become ‘little women’ at a much earlier age than their moms.  Maybe it’s Barbie, and the other imagery that little girls are exposed to.  But studies also found a trend of earlier puberty in girls in the last few decades, that may be related to an obesity epidemic.
One study showed that being overweight as a child and shorter height may contribute to an earlier puberty in girls, starting as early as age nine. And another study found that a mother’s age of menarche may predict her children’s early growth and risk …read more

Some men have more success than others in producing children, genetically speaking, that is.
New findings have identified a gene that endows some men more reproductive prowess than their neighbor, according to an article by The Scientist. And the secret is a switch in amino acids within one gene – from an amino acid called methionine to valine.
Carole Ober of the University of Chicago, presented her findings at the Sackler Colloquium on Evolution in Health and Medicine in Washington, DC and she found that “men who carried two copies of the valine allele were 2.6 times more likely to conceive than …read more

It is awfully heartbreaking when the doctor can’t tell if you gave birth to a boy or a girl.
Sex organs develop early in the fetus such that the baby’s sex can be determined as early as 19-20 weeks in the womb. Unfortunately, the sex organs of about 1 in 15,000 births could be difficult to determine prenatally or at birth. In such babies, a defective gene is the likely culprit.
Congenital adrenal hyperplasia, or CAH refers to autosomal recessive diseases where the adrenal glands fail to produce sufficient amounts of hormones known as cortisol. Mutations are found in genes …read more

A new study found that premature ejaculation is not purely psychological. Genetics has a lot to do with it.
Scientists from Utrecht University in the Netherlands studied 89 Dutch men who had "primary premature ejaculation", which means they suffered from it from their first sexual contact. They were compared with 92 men who had no such history. In men with premature ejaculation, the serotonin was deficient in the area of the brain that controls ejaculation.
Serotonin is a neurotransmitter that controls body temperature, sleep, sexual activity, appetite and emotions such as anger, aggression and mood. A common polymorphism (5HTTLPR) within …read more

This article reported within the BBC website is fascinating and incredibly rare …
An Australian mother has given birth to a healthy  baby daughter who developed in her ovary! The discovery was made during a  routine cesarean operation. Durga – meaning Goddess – was born at 38 weeks weighing 6lb 3oz (2.8 kg).
Most ectopic pregnancies end in miscarriage or are terminated early because of the risk to the mother.  Just 1-2% of all pregnancies are ectopic, and in 95% of those cases the egg is fertilised in the fallopian tubes on its way to the uterus.  In 0.5% of cases, including this one, the …read more