> Phil wrote:
>
> "Here is a picture of what we have been talking about: Picture of a
> blastocyst - an eight cell pre-embryo prior to tranfer to the uterus."
>
> http://www.ivf.com/galart.html
here i go again
nice stereoscopic microscope is what it takes
to even see something this small
i used to culture tissue from a lot of sources
to look at the chromosomes:
tumors for research--oncocytogenetics.
clinical studies included
bone marrow and blood for leukemia
lymph nodes and various biopsies
blood for hereditary problems
amniotic fluid or chorionic villus
usually for downs syndrome detection.
and then there were the POC's (products of conception)--
those were spontaneously aborted fetuses (miscarriages)
and usually, the lost pregnancy was not the first time around.
something was wrong and chromosome morphology
sometimes gives a clue.
most have been dead in utero for days
they are "macerated" -- being reabsorbed and falling apart
one came in a zip loc baggy,
carefully opened
it remained sterile and was cultured successfully.
another memorable one
came from mississippi on a bus, in a gallon jar.
there was plenty of material to work with.
badly macerated, i dissected out kidney tissue samples
and then tissues from a few other places.
most were the size of a thumbnail
and fit easily in a petri dish.
i would mince the POC into small pieces with a scalpel
and then some of the sample was divided
and put in another dish and digested
with hyaluronidase and trypsin
to get a single cell suspension and more cultures started
POC's were not my favorite tissue to work on.
a blastula would be a piece of cake...
small, chemical dissociation, small multi-well lab ware,
not messy.
a potential human only if implanted in a uterus.
if not implanted...it will not survive, long.
value or anti-value?
the reason i've taken you through these procedures
is because i'm sorting out how i feel about this...
if i were still a cytogenetic technician...
i would not have a problem culturing a blastula,
especially knowing that a possible cure
for a form of human suffering could come of it.
just my opinion
..........................................................................
Ray Strand
...on the edge of the prairie abyss ......................
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48/47 dx/40 ?onset
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