While media reports regularly remind us of women's biological clocks and warn of the dangers of women leaving it 'too late'to have children, until recently little attention has been paid to the role of men in timing when to have children, and the effect of age on male fertility. However, July 2017 saw a surge of interest in this in mainstream media, following evidence from the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School presented at the European Society for Human Reproduction and Embryology's (ESHRE) annual conference. Findings from a study of 18,802 IVF cycles suggest that amongst couples undergoing the procedure, for men over 35 increasing age was associated with lower cumulative incidence of live birth. Outlets including TheGuardian, theBBC (includingBBC Radio 4) and BioNews picked up on these findings, bringing this discussion into the public domain. The Guardian and theBBC also reported findings from asystematic review, from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, of recent trends in sperm counts, which reported a decline in sperm concentration and count between 1971 and 2011.

Thus the accepted wisdom that men can continue to have children into later life, easily and without consequence, has been called into question. In some articles, authors blame men's lack of awareness of age-related fertility decline, and lazy or glib attitudes towards having children, either explicitly or implicitly. Alongside this, coverage of recent research (Inhorn, Baldwin, Gurten) on egg freezing suggests that women freeze their eggs because they are not able to find a suitable male partner; there is a 'dearth of eligible men' wherein the number of qualified, professional women is not matched by an equivalent number of qualified, professional men. These accounts have added weight to the idea that men's roles in relationships, in starting a family, and in when to start a family are of crucial importance.

Prior to this, to a large extent media attention had mirrored social science research on the topic: the minimal focus on men being greatly outweighed by a focus on women. This is also reflected in our national data collection: while the Office for National Statistics (ONS) gathers data on women's ages at the birth of their first child, this is not the case for men; for men, a distinction between first and subsequent children is not made, as it is for women. Consequently, while we can track changes in the age at which women are becoming mothers, we cannot track trends in when men are becoming fathers.

Nonetheless, ONS data does suggest that the average age of men at the birth of any children has risen from 31.1 in 1993 to 33.2 in 2015. Research suggests that the majority of men want children, and being an 'older' father isn't something most desire. Men identify certain pre-conditions as necessary before embarking on parenthood, including being in a good relationship with the right partner and someone whom they feel would make a good parent; having financial and material security; and feeling emotionally and psychologically ready. Men's aspirations to be both the breadwinner, as well as a nurturing and involved father, also create added pressures.

However, scientific evidence about the impact of age on men's fertility, while still contested, appears to be a growing. A 2015systematic review of 90 studies identified age-associated declines in semen volume, percentage motility, progressive motility, normal morphology and unfragmented cells. Elsewhere,evidence suggests that advanced paternal age is also linked with increased risk of infertility, miscarriage and various pathological conditions in offspring. In addition, the 2013 NICE fertility guidelines reported that there was now evidence of declining male fertility with increasing age, for the first time.

All these developments point towards the need to take greater consideration of the role of men in reproductive timings (and in whether, when and why women opt to freeze their eggs) and related research both social and medical. If age does indeed play a role in men's fertility health, this needs to be taken into account in research, policy and practice.

Finally, we need to question why women's behaviours and reproductive 'choices' are routinely held to account in delayed childbearing, not men's; a greater focus on men will go some way to redress the balance. In 2013 Reproductive Biomedicine Online published a special issue on age-related fertility decline, beginning with the piece 'Cassandra's prophecy: why we need to tell the women of the future about age-related fertility decline and 'delayed' childbearing'. In the lively debate that followed, authors considered whether 'telling' women is sufficient, and grappled with how this complex issue can be addressed. Perhaps the recent media interest in men, age and fertility is a sign that the time for a full and frank debate about talking to men about age-related fertility decline both women's and men's - will soon be upon us.

Read more here:
Men, delayed childbearing and age-related fertility decline - BioNews

The work on the repair of a gene in human eggs, reported in the journal Nature, is an important scientific achievement. It made use of Crispr (clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats) technology to make a single specific change in the three billion units of the human genome. The work is indeed a stunning application of Crispr, with some elegant and surprising results and the publicity is good for my science but it is not likely to change the way reproductive medical genetics is practised and it raises no new ethical problems.

The claims made for the work, amplified by the media, will raise expectations in families carrying genes with severe medical effects and has already excited the critics who fear that geneticists are busy undermining our society. So let us first look at what has been achieved in the science, and then tease out some of the implications.

Medical genetic disorders cause a great deal of suffering and affect about one person in 25. Genetic engineering and DNA sequencing invented in the 1970s led to a revolution in genetics. Mutant genes causing many genetic disorders have been identified. Advances in human embryology led to in-vitro fertilisation (IVF) in 1978, leading to the birth of more than five million children and untold happiness in their families. The question arose whether IVF could be useful in dealing with medical genetic cases.

By the early 1990s geneticists could detect mutant genes in single cells taken from IVF embryos without harming the embryos. This led to the gradual introduction of preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD). Today parents who are concerned that they may conceive a child with a significant genetic disorder can produce embryos by IVF, these may be tested for the genetic defect and one or more unaffected embryos can then be implanted.

PGD requires a specific probe for each genetic mutation. Some mutations are common, such as F508 in cystic fibrosis, but for many families the mutations have to be analysed and specific probes prepared and tested. As many people know, IVF is itself complex PGD adds another level of complexity, meaning that the number of successful clinical cases dealt with worldwide to date is still only a few thousand. PGD is in its infancy.

So what will be the clinical impact of the new method on PGD? In their experiments, biologist Shoukhrat Mitalipov and his fellow researchers treated 58 embryos in which about 50 per cent carried the normal and half the mutant gene. After treatment they found that 42 (or 72 per cent) carried two normal genes. The mutant gene had been repaired in an estimated 13 out of 29 embryos. Crucially, not all embryos were repaired, nor was it possible to say that Crispr did not cause other unintended, off-target damage to other genes. The embryos were not implanted.

The authors suggest that repair by Crispr will increase the efficiency of PGD. In fact it will have almost no practical effect on PGD services, for two reasons. First, not all of the defective genes are repaired, so after Crispr the embryos still have to be screened by standard PGD to avoid implanting mutant genes. Second, repairing is much more complicated than the current method, which is already complicated. Two Swedish commentators who work in the field note dryly: Embryo genetic testing [PGD] during IVF remains the standard way to prevent the transmission of inherited diseases in human embryos.

In contrast to its use in reproductive medical genetics, use of Crispr in repairing genes in body tissues is a really promising approach to treating genetic disorders after birth, but that is another story.

What do we really need to do in developing PGD? The technical priority is to make IVF itself more efficient. Then we need to refine the current methods of PGD and apply them routinely to a much wider range of genetic mutations. The social priority is to provide PGD on national health services to all couples faced with a high chance of conceiving a child with a major genetic disorder.

Now what about the ethics? Since PGD, which is a medical procedure, is well accepted in international medicine there is nothing new on that front. If in the past, like the Catholic Church, you opposed IVF (and PGD), or the wishes of parents to avoid having children with genetic disorders, this work will not change opinions, and should not increase your concerns.

It is possible that the Crispr techniques of changing genes will be used for non-medical purposes in reproduction, for example to alter genetic qualities which have nothing to do with health. In the UK, such use is regulated by the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority, and might be made illegal (as for example is the non-medical use of PGD for sex selection). But it may be more difficult to make all applications illegal for example, parents might wish to have a child with blue instead of brown eyes, and if so is foolishness something we should make illegal?

One thing is clear. It is long past time that we put into effect the recommendations of the Irish Commission on Assisted Human Reproduction of 2005 dealing with these issues, which are not new, and are well known to the Government. IVF is not regulated in Ireland, nor is PGD, making it difficult for pioneers in the field such as Dr John Waterstone of Cork Fertility to provide a service that is badly needed in Ireland.

David McConnell is fellow emeritus of the Smurfit institute of genetics at Trinity College Dublin. He is a former chairman of The Irish Times Trust.

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Impact of gene editing breakthrough will be muted - Irish Times

25 YEARS AGO 1992

The Ticonderoga High School cafeteria was recently jam-packed with people who came to argue the fate of Moses-Ludington Hospital.

About 300 hospital supporters attended the unification meeting, called by Dr. William Brennan, DDS.

Moses-Ludington is slated to go out of business at the end of the year unless a solution to a cash shortfall can be found.

Local officials are working on a plan to give the medical center the $920,000 in property taxes that an Aug. 4 subsidy referendum would have provided had it been successful.

When Dan Jerry announced that he and his wife, Laurie, were opening Plattsburghs first personal computer shop in 1980, some people said he was crazy.

Today, U-Compute has not only become a highly successful business but also brought the computer age to the North Country, and they call him a visionary.

Now, Dan plans to open Captain Computer Tutor, a one-week computer course that will take place aboard a luxury sailboat chartered off the Florida Keys.

A group of local women will be testing the market for an indoor skating arena in Plattsburgh. Roller skating will now be available at the Crete Memorial Civic Center.

Sheila Prophitt, Donna Trombley, Talisa Brunet and Maryanne Dubrey will be voluntarily running the activity at the Crete.

After building some skills in the Education for Gainful Employment program, the women have become determined to make their mark in the businessworld.

50 YEARS AGO 1967

Dr. Robert Francoeur, a geneticist from Farleigh Dickinson University, told an audience at Plattsburgh State University College that the basic question before the world today is: Has the scientist gone too far has he created an inhuman world?

Francoeur did not answer the question. Instead, he told of some of the recent advances in embryology that could change the world, including using a miniature TV camera to transmit color pictures from inside the womb.

The result of Justice Harold Sodens reapportionment plan will be realized when 10 Clinton County legislators will be elected to do away with the town-based system of government.

Party committees had to reorganize quickly this month from town committees to area committees.

The theory behind the restructuring is to have the lawmakers represent equal population areas, not town-based political subdivisions with widely disparate populations.

An authority on atmospheric electricity will discuss The Mysteries of Atmosphere Electricity: Thunderstorms, Tornadoes and Volcanoes at the Atmospheric Sciences Research Center field station on Whiteface Mountain.

Dr. Bernard Vonnegut, now a senior scientist at Albany State University College, was the first person to suggest using silver iodide as a cloud-seeding agent.

75 YEARS AGO 1942

Experiments with both the jet and spray system of combating incendiary bombs were conducted recently in Trinity Park by the Plattsburgh Fire Department in connection with the class for auxiliary firemen.

According to Carl B. Getman, civilian protection coordinator, the jet proved to be the most efficient and rapid method of controlling and extinguishing the bombs.

Plattsburghs three-day salvage-collection campaign will begin with collections scheduled in Wards 1 and 2.

Boy and Girl Scouts will canvass every home, distributing cards to remind the residents that collections of their salvage will be made later in the day.

Those donating salvage metals, rags or rubber have been asked to place the articles near the curb before 5 p.m.

One hundred tons of salvage of all types is the goal of the drive.

Ive just caught the biggest thing that ever was taken alive out of Lake Champlain, is the statement that was recently credited to Police Sgt. Elmer E. Gray about a fish he caught.

So large was the beast that Gray required a block and tackle to lift it from his boat to the shore.

Dont ask us where he put it.

Also note that there is no certainty as to the authenticity of the fish involved in this yarn, but we feel sure there was a fish story.

100 YEARS AGO 1917

Three young girls under 18 years of age were recently taken by Chief of Police Senecal from Fraternity Hall in Plattsburgh during a dance being held there.

Their case will be brought into City Court.

A determined effort is being made by the local authorities to enforce the law relative to young girls attending public dances.

That Clinton County is recognized as a seed potato section is again evidenced by the fact that 30 large commercial potato growers from Suffolk and Nassau counties are visiting to find their source of seed potatoes for the 1918 planting.

In this potato party will be two Farm Bureau managers and also a number of farmers representing farmer organizations that annually buy many carloads of seed potatoes.

At an early morning hour, people residing in the neighborhood at the junction of Broad and Beekman streets in Plattsburgh were aroused by the moans of a man lying in the road.

Beside him was burning a small automobile lamp.Nothing else could be seen in the road.

While a householder was dressing to go out and investigate, an automobile came along and picked up the man, lamp and anything else that might have been in the road.

Who the man was or what befell him is not known.

Compiled by Night Editor Ben Rowe

Original post:
Lookback: Week of Aug. 7 to Aug. 14 - Plattsburgh Press Republican

WASHINGTON CRISPR is a revolutionary gene-editing technique that allows scientists to insert, remove and correct DNA within a cell with pinpoint precision.

But gene editing is controversial because it involves altering the human genetic code. It also evokes a future where humans can order "designer" babies with specific features - blonde hair, athleticism, perhaps even intelligence. That, though, is some way off as scientists say we do not yet know how to genetically enhance such traits.

Yet, there is also the prospect of avoiding heritable, genetic diseases that can handicap or kill, meaning a chance to improve a human life.

For Professor Peter Braude, a reproductive health expert from King's College London, the study showed that "germ line genome editing has moved from future fantasy to the world of possibility". The debate about using it in practice "needs to run to catch up".

Professor Darren Griffin of the University of Kent, in Britain, said: "Perhaps the biggest question, and probably the one that will be debated the most, is whether we should be physically altering the genes of an IVF (lab- created) embryo at all.

"Equally, the debate on how morally acceptable it is not to act when we have the technology to prevent these life-threatening diseases must also come into play."

Currently, the only way to avoid heritable disease in assisted reproduction is to fertilise eggs in the lab, analyse the DNA of the resulting embryos, and eliminate those containing errors.

Much more research is needed before the method can be tested in clinical trials, now impermissible under US federal law. But if the technique is found to work safely with this and other mutations, it might help couples who could not otherwise have healthy children. Potentially, it could apply to any of more than 10,000 conditions caused by specific inherited mutations.

Researchers and experts said those might include breast and ovarian cancer, as well as diseases like Huntington's, Tay-Sachs, beta thalassemia, and even sickle cell anaemia, cystic fibrosis or some cases of early-onset Alzheimer's.

"You could certainly help families who have been blighted by a horrible genetic disease," said Dr Robin Lovell-Badge, a professor of genetics and embryology at the Francis Crick Institute in London, who was not involved in the study.

Concerns, though, remain.

A group of 11 organisations, including the American Society of Human Genetics and Britain's Wellcome Trust, on Wednesday issued a statement recommending against genome editing that culminates in human implantation and pregnancy, while supporting publicly funded research into its potential clinical applications.

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE, NYTIMES, REUTERS

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Gene editing stirs debate on 'designer' babies - The Straits Times

Profile Articles Activity

Joyce Harper is Professor of Human Genetics and Embryology at University College London in the Institute for Womens Health where she is head of the Reproductive Health Department, Principal Investigator of the Embryology, IVF and Reproductive Genetics Group, Director of Education and Director of two MSc programmes - Prenatal Genetics and Fetal Medicine and Reproductive Science and Womens Health. She has been working in the fields of IVF and reproductive genetics since 1987 and written over 170 scientific papers and published two textbooks. Her research includes preimplantation genetic diagnosis, factors affecting preimplantation development, comparison of in vivo and in vitro development, differences in culture media, embryo selection methods, sperm DNA damage and social and ethical issues surrounding IVF and reproductive genetics including gamete donation, surrogacy, social egg freezing, religious views to ART and fertility education and awareness.

Joyce is passionate about public engagement to discuss all aspects of womens health, including wellbeing. She has established a public engagement group with daily posts http://www.globalwomenconnected.com. Joyce is writing a book covering womens health from birth to death. She is deputy chair of the UK Fertility Education Initiative, trying to improve fertility awareness in the UK and a member of the Fertility Arts Education Project Steering Group.

Joyce has had many senior roles in the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology (ESHRE), including establishing the ESHRE PGD Consortium. She is chair of the HFEA Horizon Scanning Group and an advisor to the HFEA Science and Clinical Advances Advisory Committee. She is on the Board of the British Fertility Society. She is a member of the Nuffield Council for Bioethics working group on genome editing.

For further information see http://www.joyceharper.com.

1987

Kings College London, PhD

1984

Queen Elizabeth College, BSc

Read more:
Joyce Harper - The Conversation UK

Scientists find dead conjoined twin bats in Brazil. Picture: MARCELO R. NOGUEIRA: LABORATRIO DE CINCIAS AMBIENTAIS

THEY say two heads are better than one

Scientists have been left completely astonished after finding the perfectly preserved remains of dead conjoined twin bats under a tree in Brazil, reports The Sun.

It is only the third recorded case of conjoined bats and experts are now examining their remains to find out more about the phenomena.

Scientists find dead conjoined twin bats in Brazil. Picture: LABORATRIO DE RADIOGRAFIAS, MUSEU NACIONAL, UNIVERSIDADE FEDERAL DO RIO DE JANEIROSource:Supplied

The bats are believed to have been stillborn and still had the placenta attached when they were discovered under a mango tree in the southeast of the country.

Marcelo Nogueira, from the State University of Northern Rio de Janeiro, said: We believe the mother of these twins was roosting in this tree when she gave birth.

It is our hope that cases like this will encourage more studies on bat embryology, an open and fascinating field of research that can largely benefit from material already available in scientific collections.

Scientists find dead conjoined twin bats in Brazil. Picture: NADJA L. PINHEIRO, FROM REA DE EMBRIOLOGIA, UNIVERSIDADE FEDERAL RURAL DO RIO DE JANEIROSource:Supplied

Little is known about conjoined animals. Just one in around 200,000 human births involved conjoined twins.

Survival rates are around 15 per cent in humans but are thought to be much lower in the animal world.

An X-ray shows the male bats have separate heads and necks but their spines eventually merge into one.

Scientists find dead conjoined twin bats in Brazil. Picture: NADJA L. PINHEIRO, FROM REA DE EMBRIOLOGIA, UNIVERSIDADE FEDERAL RURAL DO RIO DE JANEIROSource:Supplied

They also have two separate but similar size hearts.

The total breadth of the twins, including wingspan, measures around 13cm.

Based on their physical characteristics the scientists determined they were most likely Artibeus bats.

This story first appeared on The Sun.

Here is the original post:
Scientists baffled by bizarre conjoined twin bats found dead under a tree - NEWS.com.au

THEY say two heads are better than one

Scientists have been left "completely astonished" after finding the perfectly preserved remains of dead conjoined twin bats under a tree in Brazil, reportsThe Sun.

It is only the third recorded case of conjoined bats and experts are now examining their remains to find out more about the phenomena.

The bats are believed to have been stillborn and still had the placenta attached when they were discovered under a mango tree in the southeast of the country.

Marcelo Nogueira, from the State University of Northern Rio de Janeiro, said: "We believe the mother of these twins was roosting in this tree when she gave birth.

"It is our hope that cases like this will encourage more studies on bat embryology, an open and fascinating field of research that can largely benefit from material already available in scientific collections."

Little is known about conjoined animals. Just one in around 200,000 human births involved conjoined twins.

Survival rates are around 15 per cent in humans but are thought to be much lower in the animal world.

An X-ray shows the male bats have separate heads and necks but their spines eventually merge into one.

They also have two separate but similar size hearts.

The total breadth of the twins, including wingspan, measures around 13cm.

Based on their physical characteristics the scientists determined they were most likely 'Artibeus' bats.

Little is known about conjoined animals. Just one in around 200,000 human births involved conjoined twins.

Survival rates are around 15 per cent in humans but are thought to be much lower in the animal world.

An X-ray shows the male bats have separate heads and necks but their spines eventually merge into one.

Go here to read the rest:
Two-headed bat baffles scientists - Bundaberg News Mail

Whats the weight?

Jenny Elia Pfeiffer/Getty

By Jessica Hamzelou

SINCE the first test tube baby arrived 39 years ago, an estimated 6.5 million children have been born thanks to IVF and similar techniques. But we are only just starting to learn about the long-term health of people conceived using assisted reproduction techniques (ART), who may have a higher risk of obesity in later life.

Today, 1 in every 30 babies in Japan is conceived by ART, says Tomoya Hasegawa of Tokyo Medical University. These babies are usually healthy, but tend to have a lower birth weight. Large studies that didnt look at conception method have previously found that low birth weight is linked to adult obesity and diabetes.

To investigate further, Heleen Zandstra of Maastricht Medical Centre, the Netherlands, and her team have been comparing the effects of using two different culture media to support the growth of early IVF embryos. Earlier they had found that one of these was associated with babies that were 112 grams lighter at birth than those beginning life in the other medium. Thats a big difference, considering babies only weigh about 3 kilograms, says Zandstra.

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Now the team have followed up on these babies at the age of 9, recording the height, weight and fat mass of 136 children, as well as blood pressure and heart rate.

They were surprised to find that, while children conceived using each type of culture medium were around the same height, the BMI of the group that had been lighter at birth was an average of 0.9 lower than those who had been heavier babies. There was a difference in weight of 2 kilograms, says Zandstra.

Given that heavier children are more likely to develop obesity later on, the results are worrying

However, both groups were heavier than average 9-year-olds living in similar circumstances, and had more abdominal fat. Given that heavier children are more likely to become obese later in life, the results are worrying, says Zandstra, who presented her findings at the annual meeting of the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology (ESHRE) in Switzerland in July.

At the same meeting, Hasegawa presented his analysis of 1830 children in Japan. His team found that babies conceived using ART were heavier than naturally conceived babies when they were born, but there was no real difference at 18 months. However, the ART children were heavier again at 6 years old. The results were surprising, says Hasegawa.

What this might mean for adult health in unknown. Louise Brown, the first person born via IVF, is only 39 we dont know yet what will happen to IVF-conceived people in their 50s, says Zandstra.

But people neednt be wary of fertility treatment. We know that IVF is safe, because we have so many children, says Arianna DAngelo, who coordinates the ESHRE group on safety in assisted reproduction. We shouldnt worry, but we should be doing more to monitor children. Studies might flag up problems later in life, says DAngelo.

This article appeared in print under the headline IVF babies grow up to be heavier

More on these topics:

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IVF babies grow up heavier and may have higher risk of obesity - New Scientist

At first, it looks like a painting from the school of abstract expressionism. A red, central column spiked with narrow yellow bands stands brilliantly against a black field. But actually this is a photograph capturing bacteria in communication with one another, releasing signal molecules in a process known as quorum sensing. These bacteria have colonized the inside of a flow cell, a chamber that liquid courses through to simulate environments where bacteria live, such as water pipes or your intestines. Minyoung Kevin Kim, a graduate student, photographed this behavior during his research in the Bassler and Stone labs.

His photo, Bacterial Communication in Complex Geometry and Flow, is just one of sixty new works lining the light-filled hallway of Princeton Universitys Friend Center, an engineering library, as part of the eighth Art of Science exhibition. The exhibition showcases images scientists generate during their usual course of research in fields from embryology to plasma physics. These curated images are not merely scientifically relevant; they were chosen for the aesthetic qualities they also possess.

It is scientific data, but it is also art. The exhibitions strength lies in challenging us to hold in our minds these twoseemingly dissonant ideas simultaneously. As an artist and a fourth year doctoral student in chemistry, I love going to the Art of Science. The exhibition subverts the practice of segregating my two passions into mutually exclusive realms, an all too common division I find limiting.

This years exhibition complicates the usual program. I was excited to find, alongside aesthetically pleasing data, artistic works made in the spirit of scientific inquiry, liberally defined. This includes works of art created using scientific materials or pieces exploring scientific concepts in artistic genres, such as dance.

In one such scientifically-infused creative process, a visual arts major, Louisa Willis, experimented with an overhead projector, growing agar plates of bacteria with the projectors heat and imaging the plates with the projectors light. Willis then digitally colored and layered the resulting photographs. Her final product, Bumper Moons (Experiment 8), is eerily beautiful. Colonized dishes now overlap as transparent circles of aqua and ruby. In my own research, I am a frequent streaker of antibiotic selection plates. But Willis, rather than growing bacteria in the conventional way I do, playfully upended this process. By repurposing her projector as incubator and light box both, she created an elegant piece of art/lab equipment.

By including works inspired by science, not strictly products of formal research, the latest exhibition further blurs the traditional boundaries between science and art. Presented as equals, striking juxtapositions emerge. In one video, a ballerina mimics neurotransmission events in the brain, her sharp gestures recalling the opening and closing of gap junctions linking neurons. Looping on another flatscreen is an animation of a subjects fMRI-measured brain activity as they watched the first episode of BBCs Sherlock. I laughed at the absurdity of watching one of my favorite shows in frantic fast forward, perched in the corner of the screen. Looking just below, tiny dots raced around a slowly revolving brain, marking colorful pathways, thought patterns that could have been mine.

Though the images consistently entice, rather than intimidate, the accompanying captions are more inconsistent. Some captions read like obscure scientific abstracts describing a material or technology generally, rather than focusing on the particular image. The best captions explain the content of the image itself and how the image was created.

For example, in Crystalline Mondrian, triangles in shades of blue-gray fracture the frame, creating intriguing alternations of light and dark. Turning to the caption, I discovered that the triangles compose a thin crystal film of rubrene, an organic semiconductor, where each blue is a distinct crystalline domain. Within each domain, rubrene molecules align with each other, but deviate from the alignment of rubrenes gathered in surrounding domains. I was charmed to behold a concrete manifestation of an invisible phenomena: polarized light interacting constructively or destructively with crystalline domains. As the polarized light aligns with or deviates from the angle of each domain, the light reflected is either brighter or dimmer. A fundamental physics principle comes to life in this photograph.

In each piece, viewers glimpse an experts world. An entire field of research hides in a single image or 30 seconds of video. The limited space of each piece heightened my curiosity about the broad, underlying research more effectively than a longwinded lecture or a laboratory visit ever could. The limitations created a pointed strangeness that made me crave a deeper grasp of each subject.

The Art of Science celebrates the visual outputs common to both disciplines. Art and science share a visual language and rely on creative processes. This can be challenging to recognize. Skeptical viewers might dismiss the beauty on display as unintentional, since it is not the primary objective of research. But to dismiss this beauty as accidental is too easy. Here, beauty is not an artifact, but a feature of compelling data.

The exhibition merges art and science at Princeton Universitys Friend Center until January 2018.

Read more here:
Is It Art or Is It Science? - Scientific American (blog)

The corpses of rare conjoined bats found in Brazil have given scientists a closer look into a phenomenon that has only ever been recorded twice before.

When Marcelo Rodrigues Nogueira, a postdoctoral researcher in biology at the State University of Northern Rio de Janeiro first saw the bat twins, he was "completely astonished," he wrote in an email to Live Science. "I have handled many bats [in my career], some with very impressive morphological characters (and bats are very special in this respect!), but none [were as] surprising as these twins." [See Photos of the Rare Conjoined Bats Found in Brazil]

Only two other pairs of conjoined bat twins have been reported in the scientific literature, one in 1969 and another in 2015.

Although it's not known exactly what causes identical twins to be conjoined, the phenomenon is known to occur when a fertilized egg splits too late. If an egg splits four to five days after being fertilized, two separate identical twins will form. If, however, the splitting doesn't occur until 13 to 15 days after fertilization, the fertilized egg will only separate partially, and the twins will be conjoined.

The researchers first became aware of the conjoined bats after the animals were donated to the Laboratory of Mastozoology at the Rural Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. No one from Nogueira's team, which includes embryologists Nadja Lima Pinheiro and Adriana Ventura from the Area of Embryology at the Rural Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, saw the twins right when they were found. Because of this, the scientists, aren't certain if the twins were stillborn or if they had died shortly after birth.

These conjoined bat twins, found under a mango tree in southeastern Brazil in 2001, were either stillborn or died shortly after birth.

The bats, found under a mango tree in southeastern Brazil in 2001, are dicephalic parapagus conjoined twins, which means they're oriented side by side with their whole trunks conjoined. X-rays revealed that the twins' spines form a "Y" shape, with two separate columns of vertebrae branching off at the lower back. Ultrasound images also revealed two hearts of equal size that researchers suspect are separate, the scientists said.

Since most bats have only one pup per litter, finding even nonconjoined bat twins is rare. In the five years Daniel Urban, a postdoctoral research associate in evolutionary developmental biology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, has been studying bats, he's only ever seen a single pup flying around or hanging onto its mother, he told Live Science. Urban was the lead author of the 2015 study on conjoined bat twins that was published in the journal Acta Chiropterologica.

It's even harder to find bat twins that are conjoined. But this doesn't mean conjoined twins are rarer in bats than in any other mammals, according to Scott Pedersen, a professor of biology and microbiology at South Dakota State University, who was not involved in the new study. It's just that humans find out about conjoined bats less often than they find out about other conjoined animals, he told Live Science in an email. [Image Gallery: Evolution's Most Extreme Mammals]

Even if conjoined bats are alive when they are born, it's likely that they'll die soon after, because their bodies can't sustain them, Pedersen said. Bats also tend to live in places humans aren't located, which means even if a person were to venture into a bat's domain, the person would need to find the conjoined bats before they degraded or were scavenged.

This is only made more unlikely by the fact that bats are nocturnal, said Urban. If a mother gives birth to conjoined bats during the day, it will likely be in a protected roost, which means people wouldn't see them. She may give birth while she's out in the open, but that would occur only at night, when the twins would be obscured by darkness, Urban said.

"If you combine all these factors together, it's amazing we even have any [conjoined bat twins]," he added.

This X-ray shows that the spines of these conjoined bat twins are joined at their lower backs.

Although little is known about the organs of the recently discovered conjoined bat twins, the researchers have opted not to use any invasive methods to further investigate the animals' bodies.

"It's so rare and precious that you find something like this, you don't want to do any type of destructive sampling to look further. You're, of course, very curious about it, but they're a one-shot deal so, for the most part, they're held onto until the future where a newer technology will allow us to pursue it further without completely damaging what we already have," Urban said.

The new study was published online June 16 in the journal Anatomia Histologia Embryologia.

Original article on Live Science.

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Rare Conjoined Bat Twins Found in Brazil - Live Science