Custom babies

Can I have a baby? And please be sure is blue eyed, blond haired and pale skin...





Yesterday, I came across an interesting interview in Portfolio.com, about a procedure done during the fertilisation in vitro named pre-implantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) and used to scan embryos for cosmetic traits. The interview was with Mark Hughes, one of the fathers of PGD process.

The procedure has been used before to scan embryos for life-threatening diseases for children. Although it has been banned in many countries for gender selection, in US is still allowed and because of these permissive laws, the science behind it, progressed in a different direction to the point to offer customised babies. Fertility Institutes, a clinic in Los Angeles, already announced this service last December, but had to suspend it due to the public outrage.

Hughes was asked what he thinks about using this procedure by parents to choose cosmetic traits for their babies. According to him, these technologies are a natural extension to the choice of having a baby or not. He also believes that when people refer to this technique as creating ‘designer babies’ is an ‘insult to parents, because it says that parents basically don’t have their kids’ best interest at hart.’

Further, Mr. Hughes defended PGD process by saying that every parent wants to give its child the best choices in life. I’m wondering if the colour of their eyes or hair will really make a difference for their future.

Screening embryos for cosmetic characteristic is just the beginning. Currently there is no stopping that in the near future we will screen for social characteristics like intelligence. We already let a deaf lesbian couple in Chicago to choose a deaf baby. What is next? Aren’t we opening a door for more testing that will enable parents with money to create a super race of children? It seems to me that Hitler’s dream is about to become reality…

Men unite: fatherhood is good for your brain!

Our world is still pretty unfair to women, but men, as dads have their own struggle with the society stereotypes. Usually they have to chose between a label that portraits them as somebody who pays the bills and has no clue about taking care of a child or being the guy who likes children and people are wondering wheather he's pervert or wuss.

More than often we refer to parenting only in relation to mothers, but what about men who are hands on their children, buying and changing diapers, feeding their babies, evaluating schools? Aren’t they feeling left out by the society?

New researches initially held on mices, monkeys and now on humans show that, although men don’t go through the labour ordeal, loving a woman and being the father of their children can change his body and brain making him more resourceful while improving his ability to handle stress.

Peter Gray, a anthropology professor at Nevada University, finds testosterone, one of the important factors that influences the ‘daddy brain’. He’s been working with an international team, trying to analyse the neurochemistry of a man’s brain when he is dating and settle down. These studies found lower levels of testosterone in married men, while other studies found increased levels of prolactin (the hormone of lactation) and lower levels of sex steroids in men after their baby has been born. Prolactin helps new fathers to hear their baby cries, whereas lower level of testosterone makes them more sympathetic and more ready to respond to their babies.

Understanding how fatherhood process is triggered, we can have a more understanding approach of new fathers who take in their arms their new pink and screaming bundles and say ‘Eeou!’. I mean… new mothers have nine months of preparing for this motherhood role, whereas dads can start this process only once the baby has arrived.

Jay Fagan, professor of social work at Temple University believes that the best thing for future fathers to become more committed to their partner and their child after its been born is to be more involved during their partner's pregnancy and have an active role in birth preparations.

As for society and us, mummies, we should see men who become fathers, not as unmanly Mr. Mom, but as Super Dads.

What if...? The future of reproduction

Science is heading into a new territory by creating the means to let a father carry a baby to term.Could women give up their natural right to be mothers?

by Andreea Lofgren

Two people find love, than follows marriage (or just leaving together) and than comes the baby. But what if the mother is a man?

The fact that a man who used to be a woman can become pregnant is old news now. He, Thomas Beatie and ex-she, gave birth recently to his second child, a baby boy, after giving birth last year to his daughter Susan Juliette.After going public with his second pregnancy, he said “The only thing different about me is that I can’t breastfeed my baby. But a lot of mothers don’t.” The news of a man giving birth to a baby stirred a lot of attention and some of it negative, making him declare that "We are a man, woman and child. It's ironic that we are so different but yet, we're just a family, just the same as anyone else,"

But things can become even weirder than this…male pregnancy! Now, the technology to create a baby from the DNA of two men is just one step away.Shinya Yamanaka, one of the world famous regenerative medicine scientists, outlined the idea of reprogramming stem cells to allow creating a new baby. How? A skilled biologist can take skin cells from one dad, reprogrammed it with a virus and transform it into an egg. Than take the sperm from the other dad, and bam!…you have a baby!

The only problem now is to keep the embryo healthy, as a baby made from DNA of two dads will most likely not develop properly. Rudolf Jaenisch, the co-founder of Fate Therapeutics, explains that with sperms and eggs, some genes are switched off through a natural process named imprinting. Men and women do the imprinting process differently. For the moment, Jaenich said there is no solution to this problem.

Another matter would be uterus. Well…scientist may have taken this problem out of the way too. Scientists from Edinburgh University consider there are two ways of getting a womb: building one from scratch, or import one from a willingly donor.Both scientists agree there are serious ethical issues here and they wouldn’t allow these experiments to take place under their supervision.

But, they cannot stop technology from developing either.When this will happen, scientist will get their answers, but I cannot help wondering if another battle of sexes will begin.