Ice, ice, baby!

A couple from Stockport, Greater Manchester, have conceived a second baby using sperm frozen 19 years ago. Emmanuel and Zoe Iyoha are expecting their second child after receiving IVF treatment using sperm preserved on Mr Iyoha's behalf in 1989.
Mr Iyoha was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma and a tumour on his spleen when he was 27 years old. Staff at the Christie Hospital in Manchester warned him that the chemotherapy would leave him infertile and encouraged him to have his sperm frozen so that he would have the option of having children after he recovered. Mr Iyoha expressed his gratitude,
saying: 'it was the Christie nurses who persuaded me it was something that I should do and I will be forever grateful to them for this miracle. They must have seen within me the father-in-waiting. At the time, I was far more preoccupied with the cancer'.
Mr Iyoha, a computer expert for the NHS, has had a long battle with his cancer, but is now in remission after suffering a relapse in 1995. He married Zoe, a teacher, in 2002 and the newly-wed couple were only able to consider having children together thanks to the sperm stored at St Mary's Hospital in Manchester. 'We're certainly pretty unlikely to have an unplanned pregnancy after two bouts of chemotherapy' commented My Iyoha.
Freezing sperm is the only chance many men who face chemotherapy at a young age have of preserving their fertility. Unfortunately, however, the technique does not always work, as the sperm may be left too damaged by the freezing and thawing process for IVF to be successful. It took Mr and Mrs Iyoha 12 rounds of IVF treatment including, sadly, one miscarriage before their first child, Poppy Rose, was born in 2006. Remarkably, they have conceived their second child, which is due in July, after just four rounds of IVF.
Mr Iyoha said: 'every time I think about how long it has been since my sperm was frozen I am amazed at the power of science'. He added: 'we owe it all to science and the wonderful care and support of the staff at Christie's and St. Mary's'. In 2004, doctors at St Mary's hospital reported the birth of baby conceived using sperm that had been frozen for 21 years, believed to
be the longest reported storage period for sperm successfully used for treatment.

'Internet sperm' founder jailed

John Gonzalez, the founding director of a controversial UK-based online company - 'ManNotIncluded.com', which delivered fresh sperm to women for DIY-insemination - was sentenced last week at the Wood Green Crown Court in London to sixteen months incarceration for five counts of fraudulent activities. Judge Juliet May QC said that he had 'siphoned off thousands of
pounds' in a 'sustained course of fraudulent conduct' and banned him from being a company director for five years.
The Department of Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (BERR) led the investigation, which uncovered shocking business practices - including one client receiving sperm in a dirty coffee canister, while two former employees describe how women were given sperm from donors with completely different characteristics than requested. Gonzalez was successfully
prosecuted for lying to officials, forging documents and falsifying debts to evade relinquishing assets to creditors while illegally embezzling those funds to support an opulent lifestyle. Ultimately, he pleaded guilty to two counts of fraudulent trading, one count of financial misconduct, one count of forgery and one count of perjury.
Gonzalez launched the online business June 2002 amidst stormy criticism, claiming the website was the world's first to courier fresh sperm and insemination equipment directly to lesbian, single and medically infertile couples who paid to register on the site, charging up to £7,000 for delivery. Some critics viewed the service as a threat to the family unit and dubbed the site 'morals not included'.
Gonzalez's service illustrated a loophole in current UK regulation, which governs frozen gamete storage and use, but not 'fresh' sperm. Medical practitioners and government authorities warned that this kind of service poses a potential threat to women's and the resulting child's health because the fresh sperm is not screened for any diseases. The Human Fertilisation and Embryology 1990 Act requires sperm donations to be quarantined for up to 180 days for testing. Some infections such as HIV may take up to three months to incubate, meaning that an HIV test at the time of the donation may not detect the virus even though the donor might be carrying it.
The service also presented potential legal complications. Under UK law, donors whose sperm is obtained through HFEA licensed clinics are not the legal parents of any resulting offspring. However, the legal position on the parentage of children born via sperm donated outside of HFEA license is unclear.
Gonzalez maintains that ManNotIncluded.com boasted 20 pregnancies and more than 5,000 customers. In December 2004, Gonzalez illegally liquidated the company with debt totalling over £220,000 and then continued to trade under a slightly different name. Meanwhile, he embezzled £185,000 from these company accounts.

World's Largest Swimming Pool

Can you believe this place in Chile? Imagine doing 10 laps of this pool lengthwise! On a jet-ski maybe. It is 1.3 kms long, 800 mtrs wide (8/10 of a mile long by 1/2 mile wide) at its shortest point and varies from ankle depth to 8 mtrs deep.

It employs 41 life guards and has lifesaving devices which pop out of the bottom in various locations in case of rescue requirements. Built jointly by Korean/Japanese interests, it's expected to have a business life scale of 15 years. Wonder how they clean the thing?

Cheap Trick

A man with a gun goes into a bank and demands their money.
Once he is given the money, he turns to a customer and asks, "Did you see me rob this bank?"
The man replied, "Yes sir, I did." The robber then shot him in the temple, killing him instantly.
He then turned to a couple standing next and asked the man, "Did you see me rob this bank?"
The man replied, "No sir, I didn't, but my wife did."

No Frills Airline

sQuba - World's First Swimming Car

Three decades ago James Bond (then enacted by British star Roger Moore) wowed the world with a car that could 'fly' under water in the movie "The Spy Who Loved Me". Only, it was animation and not an actual scene. But Frank M Rinderknecht, the 52-year-old automobile visionary and boss of Swiss automaker Rinspeed, has turned a dream into reality with his 'sQuba.'
Rinspeed sQuba is the most exciting thing at this year's Geneva Motor Show and is creating many a ripple.

sQuba is the world's first real submersible car that can 'move like a fish underwater'.

It can dive up to 32.8 feet (10 mt) below the surface of the water and can move at a sedate 1.8 miles per hour.

The sQuba has an open cockpit for 'safety reasons' (so that people can get out easily anytime in case of an emergency). The occupants of the car have to breathe compressed air through built-in scuba masks.

sQuba is an electric car that uses rechargeable lithium-ion batteries and 3 electric motors for propulsion. It is a zero-emission car as documented by the rotating license plate in the rear. It produces no exhaust emissions.

The 'sQuba's' filling station is the water reservoir. It is no surprise that the vehicle features powerful yet energy-saving LED lighting technology.

The first car that could drive underwater was Quandt's Amphibicar, built in 1968. Only 3,878 were produced but many are still being driven on roads. Then Gibbs Technologies came up with Gibbs Aquada in 2004 which Virgin boss Richard Branson used to break the speed record for crossing the English Channel. However, the sQuba seems to be the most exciting of them all.

To drive on the roads, the sQuba 'relies on a stainless coil-over suspension from KW automotive and large Pirelli tires mounted on custom-made forged light-weight wheels from AEZ with 17- and 18-inch diameters.

Word of Mouth