Crab Migration

Nature given a helping hand to make endangered frogs spawn

WITH fewer than 200 adult southern corroboree frogs left in the wild, scientists have initiated an IVF program to try to bring the tiny black and gold amphibians back from the brink of extinction.

The technique, carried out on the thumbnail-sized frogs in Sydney and Melbourne, involves injecting the males and females with a synthetic hormone under the skin.

Eggs are then collected by gently squeezing the females, and sperm are obtained by placing a catheter into a male's cloaca, or rear opening.

This was one of the trickier aspects of the method, said Phil Byrne, a biologist carrying out the IVF for the NSW Department of Environment and Climate Change.

"They're tiny little frogs," said Dr Byrne, of Monash University. "It's better if you have small hands."

To mimic natural processes during the frogs' "nuptial embrace" the sperm are then squirted with force onto the eggs in the laboratory.

Dr Byrne and his colleague, Aimee Silla, of the University of Western Australia, had initial success in a pilot study of IVF on corroboree frogs in Melbourne earlier in the year.

About a dozen IVF embryos were obtained. "We got fertilisation, which was exciting. But the embryos failed during the early stages of development," Dr Byrne said.

For the past fortnight they have carried out IVF with a further 38 corroboree frogs bred in captivity at Taronga Zoo, but no embryos had formed, Dr Byrne said yesterday.

A Department of Environment scientist, David Hunter, said the development of frog IVF was part of a multi-pronged strategy to try to save the southern corroboree species, which is found only in Kosciuszko National Park.

"Scientists believe its sudden and dramatic decline is due largely to the effects of a fungus known as the amphibian chytrid, which has devastated frogs worldwide," Dr Hunter said.

Installation of 25 large plastic breeding ponds at five sites in the park began last month. Eggs collected in the wild will be placed in the ponds to grow in fungus-free water until the corroboree frogs are big enough to hop out.

Girl born a record 22 years after father's sperm is frozen

A former leukaemia patient who had his sperm frozen as a teenager has fathered a baby after doctors successfully thawed his sample a record 22 years later.

Chris Biblis was 16 when doctors told him that he needed radiotherapy that would leave him sterile and recommended before going ahead with the life-saving treatment that they put a sample of his sperm into cryogenic storage for future use.

Now aged 38, he is celebrating the birth of a healthy baby daughter, Stella, who was conceived after scientists injected a defrosted sperm into an egg from his wife, Melodie, and implanted it in her uterus.

The 22-year lapse between storage in April 1986 and conception in June 2008 is a world record, according to specialists at the US fertility clinic who carried out the procedure.

The 5lb 12oz girl was born to Mrs Lesley Brown, 29, by ceasarean section just before midnight

“From my life being saved to being able to create a life, words just can’t describe where we are now,” said Mr Biblis, of Charlotte, North Carolina, who has been free of leukaemia since the age of 18.

“I’ve got this bundle of joy to appreciate. It’s truly a miracle,” he told ABC News.

The case is being hailed as an illustration of how far infertility treatment has advanced in the past two decades and proof that sperm can remain viable for decades if they are preserved in liquid nitrogen. The previous record was 21 years.

The procedure used to create Stella did not even exist when Mr Biblis gave the sample in 1986 during his six-year struggle against leukaemia.

“I was trying to get through high school and, you know, living one day at a time just hoping I was going to make it,” he said.

It was not until 1992 that the method of intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) – by which scientists carefully select a healthy sperm cell and insert it into an egg in the laboratory – was successfully pioneered.

The technique carries an increased chance of conception beyond conventional IVF procedures, in which sperm and eggs are mixed in the laboratory to fertilise spontaneously, and was used because only 35 per cent of Mr Biblis’s sperm cells were deemed viable after thawing.

Doctors selected the best of the remaining cells and injected them into ten eggs harvested from Mrs Biblis, of which seven fertilised successfully in the laboratory. Two of the embryos were implanted, though only one survived, and five remain in storage, allowing the couple the option of having more children.

“They achieved pregnancy on their first cycle of ICSI . . . We had every reason to expect a perfect baby but are thrilled nonetheless,” said Richard Wing, a fertility specialist and founder of Reproductive Endocrinology Associates of Charlotte: “I had no concern about working with old sperm – bovine and equine sperm has been frozen for long periods and has resulted in successful gestations.”

First Case of Adult Male Swine Flu

'Nursemaid' cells reveal the best IVF eggs

Genetic clues contained in the cells that nurse and nurture developing eggs could help identify which ones to choose for IVF.

There is currently little that can be done to predict which eggs are most likely to generate healthy embryos. After an egg has been fertilized, doctors can take biopsies from early embryos or examine their shape to predict which are most likely to implant and produce healthy children. Despite this, around 8 out of 10 embryos conceived through IVF fail to implant when transferred to the womb.

While an egg is developing it is nurtured by specialized cells called cumulus cells, which provide it with the nutrients it needs to grow. "The final state of the egg depends on the relationship with the cumulus cells," says Samir Hamamah at the Montpellier University Hospital in France. So he and his colleagues wondered whether there are genetic markers in these cells that could predict the quality of the resulting embryos and the likelihood of a successful pregnancy.

To investigate further, the team retrieved eggs and their associated cumulus cells from 30 women undergoing IVF. After extracting and freezing the cumulus cells, they fertilized the eggs by intra-cytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) and inspected the resulting embryos for quality. They then looked at the gene expression profiles of the cumulus cells corresponding to the eggs that produced good and bad embryos, as well as those that failed to fertilize.


This analysis showed that the levels of expression of three genes, called BCL2L11, PCK1 and NFIB, were strongly associated with embryo quality (Molecular Human Reproduction, DOI: 10.1093/molehr/gan067). BCL2L11 is involved in triggering cell death in response to abnormalities, PCK1 is associated with energy production, and NFIB regulates some of the earliest processes in embryo development.

Hamamah's finding opens up the possibility that doctors might be able to check the level of expression of these cumulus cell genes to predict the viability of the egg. "This is a novel concept, offering a new potential strategy for competent embryo selection," he told a meeting of the Preimplantation Genetics Diagnosis International Society in Miami, Florida, last week.Fertility doctors might be able to check the level of gene expression to predict the viability of an egg

He plans to confirm that this strategy works by using the three genetic markers to select eggs to fertilize and implant, and then see how many of these result in healthy pregnancies compared with those from unscreened eggs.

"Trying to establish the importance of particular gene products in assessing embryo viability is very important," says Simon Fishel, managing director of the Care fertility clinic in Sheffield, UK. "Whether it will become a valuable clinical [tool] remains to be seen. Our understanding of genes in relation to embryo viability is still crude."

USB ultrasound device coming to a Windows Mobile phone near you?

Two computer science professors at Washington University in St. Louis have produced a USB ultrasound probe which is compatible with Windows Mobile smartphones. The project, funded by Microsoft, has developed and optimized probe that uses less power, and is enhanced for data transfer rates on cellphones. The devices could be especially useful in on-the-go situations -- for ambulances, emergencies, and for use by traveling medical staff. The makers also foresee that the device could positively effect medical practice in the developing world, where equipment and doctors can be scarce, and a small, but cellphone access is ever increasingly prevalent. We don't know when these might be commercially available, but they are hoping to sell them for around $500 -- significantly cheaper than many portable ultrasounds, which can cost almost $30,000.

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