Rewiring blood cells to give rise to precursors of sperm

Different cell types—say, heart, liver, blood, and sperm cells—possess characteristics that help them carry out their unique jobs in the body. In general, those characteristics are hard-wired. Without intervention, a ...

A big step toward producing rhino gametes

To save the northern white rhinoceros from extinction, the BioRescue team is racing to create lab-grown egg and sperm cells of the critically endangered subspecies. The team has now reported a milestone in Science Advances: ...

The immortality of germ cells

Germ cells, the reproductive cells that eventually become eggs and sperm, are set aside early in embryonic development, when the embryo is just a hollow ball of cells called the gastrula. This means that the cells transferring ...

Germ cells move like tiny bulldozers

During fruit fly embryo formation, primordial germ cells—the stem cells that will later form eggs and sperm—must travel from the far end of the embryo to their final location in the gonads. Part of the primordial germ ...

Team investigates sex-determination mechanisms in birds

Scientists have known that sex-determination in vertebrates happens in the germ cells, a body's reproductive cells, and the somatic cells, the cells that are not reproductive cells. Yet they have not fully understood the ...

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