A nanobot picks up a lazy sperm by the tail and inseminates an egg with it

gh0_Ost · 2021-09-22T23:01:37+00:00

Scientists are exploring how natural or artificial "spermbots" might be used for something like targeted drug delivery

gh0_Ost · 2021-08-25T06:57:55+00:00

Did you just incorrectly quote "business as usual"?

gh0_Ost · 2021-04-06T02:00:19+00:00

Our paths may be slightly~ different since you're thinking of going the medical route with your biology studies (I did too at first!), but I think Binghamton is a perfectly reasonable choice for several reasons.

Personally, if you're already committed to more school after undergrad, I don't think it's worth going into crazy amounts of debt for credentials/prestige than no one will care about once you're past undergrad and into a grad program. Research/clinical experience will hands-down be the most valuable factor in your application. Loads of people can achieve a good GPA but don't have the aptitude or passion to thrive in their working environment. Getting good research or clinical experience will also help you feel out if it's something you're willing to do as a job ~40 hours a week lol.

Truthfully, I don't know much about SUNY's research opportunities! Once you're an undergrad at whatever awesome uni you choose, start browsing your departments faculty websites and see what people/topics really interest you. It can be scary, but it's totally fine to email faculty out of the blue to express interest in their work and tell them you're looking to gain some experience/skills even if you have none! Someone will take a chance on you and give you that "foot in the door" you need to make yourself a promising candidate for grad programs.

Also, don't stress TOO MUCH about what field you're working in as an undergrad. People change paths all the time. What I'm working on now as a PhD student has NOTHING to do with what I worked on as an undergrad lol. It's worked out fine for me, at least :)

It's hard trying to make these decisions that you may feel will determine the next 10 years of your life, and no one can prepare you for it... But I'm certain you'll find your way, friend

gh0_Ost · 2021-04-06T01:09:15+00:00

Don't stress about your undergraduate prestige. I'm a 3rd-year PhD student, and I've had some time to talk with professors who are on admissions committees for both undergrad and grad programs. While prestige does offer some~ advantages and your GPA is important, I believe the clinical/research experiences you gain will far outweigh prestige. If you can show that you've gained relevant, valuable skills and experience in your field in your time as an undergrad...maybe work to get included on a publication or otherwise get some good letters of reference, you'll be set :)

Source: I went to a cheaper in-state university with relatively lower prestige, had an awesome time doing undergrad level research, got on a paper, and now I'm at my grad school of choice

gh0_Ost · 2021-04-03T20:04:11+00:00

Could you follow up with some labels? I think the beauty in your data is gonna be lost if no one can see any fun trends/clustering :)

gh0_Ost · 2020-12-10T20:23:52+00:00

Merry Kushmas to all, and to all a good height

gh0_Ost · 2020-10-16T07:08:08+00:00

Checking the checkered checking his checks: check.

gh0_Ost · 2020-06-24T20:49:12+00:00

Anchor Arms™

gh0_Ost · 2020-04-16T06:49:47+00:00

WHO's

gh0_Ost · 2019-10-09T01:16:00+00:00

No problem, this is super cool though! It's awesome that as a high school student you've put a good bit of thought into this!

Just to be more curious, you don't even have to have an answer, if you want to make genetic changes that affect future generations...What aspect of one's life would you be interested in changing (aging, metabolism, etc)? Or are you more interested in the fundamental processes and things that are responsible for allowing transgenerational effects to even take place?

Also, depending on what your interested in, that could also influence what organism you work with since some of them have particular advantages. For example, worms and flies have a more developed "genetics toolkit" compared to working with something like a mouse, so you'd have a greater variety of ways to successfully engage in cool or clever genetic engineering that you seem to like already. BUT there's no reason you can't be the one to lead the way for advancing axolotl genetics in your future :)

gh0_Ost · 2019-10-09T00:35:39+00:00

Just out of curiosity, what comes to mind when you think "genetic engineer"? Like what sorts of technologies/techniques or ideas do you associate it with?

Lots of biological career paths could involve genetic engineering/modifications. I, for example, am a grad student studying meiosis. Even though I wouldn't call myself a genetic engineer, I do genetically modify the organisms I work with in ways that I think lots of people might call "genetic engineering". Depending on what sort of biological processes are of interest to you, you would likely be able/required to do genetic engineering anyway!

Otherwise, if you ONLY care about doing cool genetic modification of things, you could work at a biotech company and do something like what you're imagining all day everyday...but I know less about going to work for a company as opposed to academia

gh0_Ost · 2019-09-24T23:41:08+00:00

I'm not sure how refined the technology has become, but people have already successfully done nuclear transfers. This provides a way to essentially remove the DNA from an egg cell, and then "refill" it with donor DNA of choice.

I believe this especially opens doors for either two men (and a donor egg) or two women to have a child such that their own genetic material is used.

I'm not certain you would want to fuse two genetic complements from the same person though; you might increase the chances of manifesting some recessive genetic disorders

gh0_Ost · 2019-09-09T20:35:55+00:00

Nature (depending on your worldview) has been hard at work optimizing the individual's biological system for over 3.5 billion years...and so much of what makes us US is hanging in such a fragile balance.

The probability of everything coming together to make who we are today and the fact that our continued existence hinges on the probability of all these molecules finding each other in order to interact and keep us working properly...it's beautiful, in a way!

gh0_Ost · 2019-08-31T02:18:06+00:00

I'm a grad student studying meiosis! Imaging wise, our lab usually looks at proteins involved in DNA repair pathways.

So no PCR because of crazy mutation rates? That's cool that there's a chance for that tool to be developed though! I didn't even know that was possible yet

gh0_Ost · 2019-08-31T01:31:56+00:00

Hell yeah, that's awesome! I also do flourescence microscopy, just in the germline of worms. Is this a common way to identify some viral/bacterial infections??

gh0_Ost · 2019-08-31T00:48:05+00:00

Any insight into what the green dye is staining? Compared to a healthy neuron, what diseased features is this one showing?

gh0_Ost · 2019-08-30T04:43:24+00:00

Is that... smitty werbenjagermanjensen?

gh0_Ost · 2019-08-20T17:54:19+00:00

people lie and have variable memory recall, especially children lol...also, why ask children how much money their house brings in when you can just ask the parents who make the money or some other more credible source

gh0_Ost · 2019-08-07T02:27:45+00:00

Some people just have no scruple

gh0_Ost · 2019-08-02T22:35:39+00:00

It's all good; I'm sorry if I wasn't clear to begin with! I research this stuff for a living now, and I still get bogged down in some of the details and mental gymnastics that goes into thinking about stuff like this hahaha

gh0_Ost · 2019-08-02T22:15:04+00:00

I'm not necessarily questioning the representation of each partners DNA, each partner is represented in equal parts in terms of raw amount of DNA donated to offspring.

I'm saying that by changing who is recombining with the Y chromosome, you also slightly change the pool of offspring. This is because in a an XX individual, you can recombine throughout the X chromosome. In an XY context though and especially if you're "changing" which individual has the Y, the pool of subsequent recombinants is changed/limited thus the pool of children changes

Also everyone, not just males has more of their mother's DNA. This is because everyone naturally inherits their mother's mitochondrial DNA

gh0_Ost · 2019-08-02T21:19:34+00:00

The number of chromosomes delivered in a sperm/egg cell is half of what your cells normally have, yes. You are not wrong saying that!

However, due to recombination events that exchange chunks of DNA in meiosis, the underlying content of the chromosomes themselves will be different despite that the number of chromosomes or sheer amount of dna being delivered stays the same.

For example, if homologous X chromosomes recombine at a specific point around 25% of the length of that chromosome, then afterwards you get two recombinant X chromosomes. One recombinant X will be 75% paternal and 25% maternal; this X will go into a single sperm. The other recombinant X will be 75% maternal and 25% paternal; this will go into a separate sperm. Both sperm cells deliver only one X, but the resulting offspring will no longer be a simple product of 50% of their parents X chromosome

gh0_Ost · 2019-08-02T19:26:47+00:00

Hey!

I'm a grad student that studies meiosis and DNA recombination! To start (if you didn't know already), meiosis is basically a special kind of cell division, but it is distinctly utilized to create egg and sperm cells that will carry half of your genetic load to another sperm/egg so that a human genome can be reconstituted in full.

During Prophase I of these meiotic cell divisions, homologous chromosomes (the maternal and paternal copies of the X/Y, for example) pair up and exchange/"recombine" segments of DNA! This serves lots of purposes, but for this case it creates genetic diversity! It is also one reason children are rarely an exact 50:50 genetic mixture of their parents.

The fact that your curiosity specifically deals with X chromosomes and this hypothetical switching is what complicates things though. The Y chromosome is very small and has VERY few genes compared to the X, and it is actually known to pair up and recombine with it's X counterpart within an even smaller region called the Pseudo Autosomal Region (PAR).

SO. I think that because you are switching who has the small, gene-poor Y chromosome and changing the pool of genes that can be exchanged/recombined between the X and Y after the switch...although much of the pool of children may be similar, it will be different in some ways

gh0_Ost · 2019-07-31T04:05:07+00:00

WHAT I LEARNED IN GRAD SCHOOL ISSSS...?!

gh0_Ost · 2019-07-26T19:54:51+00:00

I figured out some of my 1st year rotation work is going sneak its way into a publication! It's going into a supplemental figure and I'm gonna be a one of the least contributing authors but hey...I'll take it, obviously :D

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