Research Fellow in Microfluidic Medical Devices job with UNIVERSITY OF LEEDS | 188671 – Times Higher Education (THE)

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Do you want to participate to the translation of a research idea in a real commercial solution? Do you want to improve methods for animal research and reduce the use of animals in research? Are you excited about contributing to scientific research in fertility? Are you able to manage a multicentre project, connect with international users and analyse their feedback?

We are looking for a proactive individual to join our multidisciplinary team in Leeds and to validate our new technology with end users and define a commercial product.

Our group is focused on the development of new techniques and devices for improving for diagnosis and treatment of infertility. In our team we couple our knowledge and experience in engineering and entrepreneurship with reproductive science and assistive reproductive technology to propose new solutions to current limitation in animal and human reproduction.

This vacancy is created by an NC3Rs Medical Research Council (MRC) Business Growth Scheme (BGS) grant awarded to Dr. Pensabene which aims to complete the validation of a microfluidic device for mouse embryo culture, to complete a thorough stakeholder and market analysis in preparation for the commercialization of the technology. You will work on theBGS project(From challenge to solution: definition of the characteristics of a new disposable product to improve murine embryos handling and transfer procedures) managing the full project and all the activities.

The manufacturing will be conducted by an external company, that will be instructed by you in terms of device characteristics, materials and delivery time. The external validation will be carried out at the Francis Crick Institute and at the University of Oxford and you will coordinate the experiments and analyse the results. A final phase will be dedicated to the definition of the end users needs and the optimization of the product for commercialization purpose.

Holding a PhD (or close to completion) in Biotechnology, Biomedical Engineering, Material Science, Biology, Physics or related disciplines, you will have a proven laboratory experience and track-record in biotechnology, cell culture and microscopy, together with a proactive, enthusiastic approach to research and innovation.

To explore the post further or for any queries you may have, please contact:

Virginia Pensabene, PhD, University Academic Fellow in Electronic and Electrical Engineering

Tel: +44 (0) 771 3371521 or email:v.pensabene@leeds.ac.uk

Further information

The Schools in the Faculty of Engineering & Physical Sciences are proud to have been awarded theAthena SWANBronzeorSilverAwardfromthe Equality Challenge Unit, the national body that promotes equality in the higher education sector. Ourequality and inclusion webpageprovides more information.

Location: Leeds - Main CampusFaculty/Service: Faculty of Engineering & Physical SciencesSchool/Institute: School of Electronic & Electrical EngineeringSection: The Pollard InstituteCategory: ResearchGrade: Grade 7Salary: 33,797 to 40,322 p.a. pro rataWorking Time: 50% full time equivalentPost Type: Part TimeContract Type: Fixed Term (Up to one year, available from 15 January 2020, to end by 14 January 2021)Release Date: Wednesday 04 December 2019Closing Date: Sunday 05 January 2020Interview Date: To be confirmedDownloads: Candidate Brief

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Research Fellow in Microfluidic Medical Devices job with UNIVERSITY OF LEEDS | 188671 - Times Higher Education (THE)

Human Reproduction : Audio Productions, Inc. : Free …

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The Film I Never Got to See...

The lead-in is a vignette of a little boy who presses his parents for more information about why Mommies bring babies into the world. The scripting is thin, but it serves it's purpose well enough.

When I was in grade school, neither my school nor my parents wanted anything to do with informing me about sex, or the anatomy of a man. Those were to be avoided at all costs. (I remember saying "Eewwww! I would NEVER touch a man there!!!) In the end, I got the information from the secret section in the reference department of the school library where books that were never to be taken out lived.

Some parents may balk at the idea that their child will become sexually aware, but the sad news is, holding back because your religion or upbringing prevents it, can, in this day and age, have dire health consequences. With the collapse of the laws that protected children from televised references to sex, we are seeing more and more foul language. The "F" word has become so common that it's bandied about carelessly, and using it quickly became as annoying and repulsive as "Y'know" or "Gag me with a spoon!" during the Valley Girl days came to be.

Video games and anime are both rife with sexual content, little of which is balanced or "healthy" Chances are very good that your children will know the meanings of "hentai", "yaoi", and "ecchi", long before you ever get around to talking to them yourself, and given that some Japanese sexual material is STILL couched in old traditions, they may also be exposed to depictions of forced sex and sex with children. (In ages past in Japan, it was possible to buy or trade goods for the virginity of a young girl. That would mean her first experience would be with someone much older, and whom she barely knew.)

While Japan is making solid inroads in making cultural and societal changes that ban such manga material, they will not achieve it for sometime to come, and given the spectrum I've seen thus far, no child, who has full, unsupervised access to the Internet, will be immune, and given that the Internet is the ultimate source of freely available information, any parent would be foolish not to guide the child in a safe and responsible way. After all, pioneers, trekking across the US, and the Native Americans in their many tipis all conceived and brought up families in close proximity to older children. They can handle it, if you can, and if you can't, this film might be a really good place to start. If they know that they can come to you for straight answers, they will enter the world of adults with a backup team that can support them and dispel rumors as they mature. It would be far worse if the bulk of their knowledge on the subject came from lurid cutscenes in Grand Theft Auto V.

Therefore, in summation, I heartily recommend this film for its accuracy and for its candor, and for its depiction of a functioning family able to communicate with each other.

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Human Reproduction : Audio Productions, Inc. : Free ...

Center for Human Reproduction

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State (USA-only) Choose State (USA-only) AK AL AR AS AZ CA CO CT DC DE FL GA GU HI IA ID IL IN KS KY LA MA MD ME MI MN MO MP MS MT NC ND NE NH NJ NM NV NY OH OK OR PA PR RI SC SD TN TX UT VA VI VT WA WI WV WY

Please tell us about the service you're interested in and your fertility history.

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Center for Human Reproduction

infertility problems | Best ivf centre in India | Best ICSI Clinic in India – Video

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infertility problems | Best ivf centre in India | Best ICSI Clinic in India
Virk Fertility Services is the first IVF centre in India to be accredited by NABH Safe-I. VFS Centre For Human Reproduction, an ISO 9001-2008 certified ART Centre offers a comprehensive range...

By: Centre of Human Reproduction

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infertility problems | Best ivf centre in India | Best ICSI Clinic in India - Video

best infertility treatment in india | Best ivf centre in India | Best ICSI Clinic in India – Video

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best infertility treatment in india | Best ivf centre in India | Best ICSI Clinic in India
Virk Fertility Services is the first IVF centre in India to be accredited by NABH Safe-I. VFS Centre For Human Reproduction, an ISO 9001-2008 certified ART Centre offers a comprehensive range...

By: Centre of Human Reproduction

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best infertility treatment in india | Best ivf centre in India | Best ICSI Clinic in India - Video

how much is IVF treatment in india | Best IVF and ICSI Treatment in india – Video

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how much is IVF treatment in india | Best IVF and ICSI Treatment in india
VFS Centre For Human Reproduction, an ISO 9001-2008 certified ART Centre offers a comprehensive range of infertility services under one roof and we are known for our innovation, integrity,...

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how much is IVF treatment in india | Best IVF and ICSI Treatment in india - Video

Best IVF centre in India | best ICSI treatment | IVF Treatment | Fertility | best IVF in india – Video

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Best IVF centre in India | best ICSI treatment | IVF Treatment | Fertility | best IVF in india
VFS Centre For Human Reproduction, an ISO 9001-2008 certified ART Centre offers a comprehensive range of infertility services under one roof and we are known for our innovation, integrity,...

By: Infertility Treatment

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Best IVF centre in India | best ICSI treatment | IVF Treatment | Fertility | best IVF in india - Video

Life Science 007: Human reproduction: hormonal control of female reproductive cycle – Video

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Life Science 007: Human reproduction: hormonal control of female reproductive cycle
Life Science 007: Human reproduction: hormonal control of female reproductive cycle Lesson objectives: To explain the interaction of the different hormones t...

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Life Science 007: Human reproduction: hormonal control of female reproductive cycle - Video

Human Reproduction – CPALMS

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Subject(s): Science

Grade Level(s): 9, 10, 11, 12

Suggested Technology: Computer for Presenter, Computers for Students, Internet Connection, LCD Projector

Instructional Time: 2 Hour(s) 30 Minute(s)

Resource supports reading in content area:Yes Freely Available: Yes

Keywords: Seminal vesicle, testes, prostate gland, urethra, penis, scrotum, epididymis, vas deferens, ovaries, oviduct (fallopian tubes), uterus, vagina, cervix, implantation, morula, blastocyst, gastrulation, neurulation, amniotic fluid, amnion, placenta, umbilical cord, amniotic sac, reproduction

Sorry! This resource requires special permission and only certain users have access to it at this time.

Students will:

Assessing Prior Knowledge: Why do organisms need to reproduce? Students should recall that organisms need to reproduce to continues as a species.

The teacher can review the concept maps of the reproductive system on the board.

Commit and Toss: This can be done at the end of the unit. Ask the class the question "Why is it important for a woman to be cautious of her diet and health during the first trimester of pregnancy?" The students answer the question on a small piece of paper and toss their paper across the room. The teacher calls on other students to read the answers. The teacher can make comments on the answers.

The card activity can be colored for visual learners. The activity can be cut into individual cards. The students can use the book as a resource.

High Level Extension - Students can explore the ethics and dilemmas of teen pregnancy as well as the changes that occur during pregnancy.

Students can explore the case study Amber's Secret.

The teacher may want to create the worksheet to accompany the NOVA episode "Life's Greatest Miracle."

The teacher may want to check the local school/district media centers to see if they carry a copy of the video.

The teacher needs to make a class set of the Reproductive Cards ahead of the activity.

Contributed by: Cathy Organt

Name of Author/Source: Cathy Organt

District/Organization of Contributor(s): Escambia

Is this Resource freely Available? Yes

Access Privileges: Public

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Human Reproduction - CPALMS

Toxic Exposure: Chemicals Are in Our Water, Food, Air and Furniture – University of California

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When her kids were young, Tracey Woodruff, PhD, MPH, knew more than most people about environmental toxics. After all, she was a senior scientist at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). But even she never dreamed, as she rocked her children to sleep at night, that the plastic baby bottles she used to feed them contained toxic chemicals that could leach into the warm milk.

Back then, in the late 1990s, it wasnt widely known that the chemicals used in plastic sippy cups and baby bottles can potentially disrupt child development by interfering with the hormone system. That, in turn, could alter the functionality of their reproductive systems or increase their risk of disease laterin their lives.

When I had babies, I did many of the things we now tell people not to do, says Woodruff, who for the past decade has been the director of UC San Franciscos Program on Reproductive Health and the Environment (PRHE). Also a professor in the Universitys Philip R. Lee Institute for Health Policy Studies, she earned her doctorate in 1991 from a joint UCSF-Berkeley program in bioengineering and then completed a postgraduate fellowship at UCSF.

Woodruffs children have since grown into physically healthy teenagers, but many children are not as lucky. Unregulated chemicals are increasing in use and are prevalent in products Americans use every day. Woodruff is concerned by the concurrent rise in many health conditions, like certain cancers or childhood diseases, and the fact that the environment is likely to play a role in those conditions. What motivates her is the belief that we need to know more about these toxics so we can reduce our exposure to the worst of them and protect ourselves and our children from their harmful effects. (Woodruff points out that the word toxics as a noun means any poisonous substances, from either chemical or biological sources, whereas toxins are poisons only from biological sources, either plant or animal.)

The PRHE is dedicated to identifying, measuring and preventing exposure to environmental contaminants that affect human reproduction and development. Its work weaves together science, medicine, policy and advocacy.

For example, research over the past 10 years by UCSF scientists and others has showed that bisphenol A (BPA) an industrial chemical used since the 1950s to harden plastics in baby bottles, toys and other products is found in the blood of those exposed to items made with BPA and that it can harm the endocrine systems of fetuses and infants. As a result, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) outlawed BPA in baby products in 2012, and some manufacturers developed BPA-free products. But now scientists believe the chemicals that replaced BPA may be just as harmful.

Furthermore, BPA is only one in a long, long list of chemicals we encounter every day in our homes, schools, workplaces and communities. And scientists have barely scratched the surface of understanding them. Of the thousands and thousands of chemicals registered with the EPA for use by industry, the agency has regulated only a few.

In the last 50 years, we have seen a dramatic increase in chemical production in the United States, Woodruff explains. Concurrently, theres been an increase in the incidence of conditions like attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), autism, childhood cancers, diabetes and obesity. Its not just genetic drift, Woodruff maintains.

And were all at risk from increasing chemical exposure. The water we run from our taps, the lotion we smear on our skin, the shampoo we rub in our hair, even the dust in our houses is full of synthetic chemicals.

PRHE experts do more than just measure such trends. They also collaborate with clinical scientists and obstetricians at Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital (ZSFG), so their findings directly benefit pregnant patients. We partner with the clinical scientists, explains Woodruff, because they look at treatments for disease, and environment might be a missing factor in the cause and prevention of disease.

Though environmental toxics affect us all, theres a reason PRHE focuses on pregnant women and children, Woodruff adds. Exposure to even tiny amounts of toxic substances during critical developmental stages can have outsize effects. So exposure to toxics is especially detrimental to fetuses, infants and young children, as well as preteens and teenagers.

If you prevent the problem at the beginning, you get a lifetime of benefits, says Woodruff.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) began measuring human exposure to chemicals in 1976. These so-called biomonitoring studies found a range of toxics in subjects blood and urine substances like DDT, BPA, air pollutants, pesticides, dioxins and phthalates. Phthalates, for example, are a class of chemicals known to be endocrine disruptors but widely used as softeners in plastics and as lubricants in personal-care products. Biomonitoring has determined that women of reproductive age evidence higher levels of phthalates than the population at large. One reason, says Woodruff, is that young women use more products like perfume, deodorant, shampoo and conditioner.

Woodruff herself recently led a study in which UCSF researchers collected blood samples from pregnant women at ZSFG. After the women delivered their babies, the researchers collected umbilical cord blood samples and discovered that almost 80 percent of the chemicals detected in the maternal blood samples had passed through the placenta to the cord blood. It was the most extensive look yet at how the chemicals that pregnant women are exposed to also appear in their babies cord blood (and followed an earlier study by Woodruff that marked the first time anyone had counted the number of chemicals in the blood of pregnant women). Published in the Nov. 1, 2016, print edition of Environmental Science and Technology, the study also found that many chemicals were absorbed at greater levels by the fetuses than by the pregnant women.

Now, Woodruff is hard at work on a new grant from the federal Environmental Influences on Child Health Outcomes (ECHO) Program. It aims to correlate childrens exposure to toxics with their developmental outcomes from birth to age four.

The good news is that the work done by Woodruff and her team shows a clear impact. Following bans (some permanent and some temporary) on certain phthalates, for example, UCSF researchers measured declines in the urinary concentrations of the permanently banned types in a representative sample of the U.S. population.

Tracy Woodruff spreads the word about toxics at UCSF's Stand Up For Science teach-in. Photo by Noah Berger

Woodruffs degree is in engineering, and she notes that in the 1980s, when she was in school, a lot of engineers went into the defense industry. People talk about joining the military to serve their country, Woodruff says. I also wanted to do something positive for society, and I felt joining the EPA was the best way to serve my country.

She spent 13 years at the federal agency, as a scientist and policy advisor, studying the effects of air pollution on childrens health. The topic interested her, she says, because children are vulnerable and cant speak for themselves. Her analysis of data collected under the Clean Air Act, for example, found that air pollution is linked to infant mortality. She also determined that pregnant African American women had higher exposure to air pollution and more adverse pregnancy outcomes than the population at large.

Nearly 25 years later, her work at UCSF is motivated by the same sense of advocacy and zeal. She joined the PRHE in 2007, shortly after its founding by Linda Giudice, MD, PhD. What we do, she says, is bring the best scientific tools from the varied fields at UCSF to bear on uncovering and better understanding the links between the environment and health and translate that science into prevention by improving public policy.

While Woodruff has many influential scientific publications to her name, shes also a sought-after guest for radio interviews and talk shows. She even appeared in a popular 2013 documentary, The Human Experiment, narrated by Sean Penn. In response to questions from the public, she tries to strike a practical note. You dont want to freak people out, she says. At the same time, people assume if they can buy it, its safe. That is just not the case.

In her own home in Oakland, Woodruff has made slow changes over time. I got rid of carpet. ... The padding can contain toxic chemicals. I waited to buy a couch ... too long according to my family, she laughs. (Couches without flame-retardants didnt become available in California until after the state changed its flammability standard in 2014, making it possible to sell couches that are flammability-safe but are made without flame-retardant chemicals.) I still have a couch that probably has flame-retardants, but I am just ignoring it. We eat mostly organic to reduce pesticide exposure. Less is more in personal-care products, she adds.

Does she make her own shampoo?

Oh, my God, no, she answers. Who has the time? This should not be a burden to people. Systems should be in place so that we can be free of the burden. This is why we need the EPA, and this is where policy comes in.

Its important for people to realize there are things you can do to lower your exposure to toxic chemicals, but some things you cant do.

For example, Woodruff explains, Americans would have had a hard time limiting their exposure to lead before leaded gasoline became illegal in 1996 (though the phaseout started in the mid-1970s). Until then, no amount of personal awareness could protect someone from lead it was in the air that everyone breathed.

She offers another example specific to the PRHEs efforts. When California outlawed flame retardants, she says, we saw levels decrease by about two-thirds in the blood of pregnant patients at ZSFG. Through these studies, we can evaluate the effectiveness of public policy. Its clear that when the government acts to reduce exposures to toxic chemicals ... we see a positive change. We do not always consider EPA a public health agency, but it is.

Woodruff and her colleagues also have been working over the last several years to help strengthen the federal Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) of 1976. It was well recognized that the law was flawed and allowed thousands of chemicals to be used in the marketplace without testing for safety, she explains. When bipartisan calls to strengthen the law led Congress to amend it in 2016, PRHE experts partnered with obstetricians and gynecologists to provide scientific evidence about the need for improved standards, deadlines and transparency. As rules for the amended TSCA are rolled out over the next two years, well be right in there to promote the use of science for the publics health, says Woodruff.

Shes also bringing environmental toxics to the attention of her UCSF colleagues in other disciplines. One of the reasons we love being at UCSF is we can learn from people who are doing completely different things, she says. For example, she is working with researchers who study the placenta, since her 2016 study showed that environmental toxics permeate the placenta. And with developmental biologist Diana Laird, PhD, an associate professor in the Center for Reproductive Sciences, Woodruff is co-leading the Environmental Health Initiative (EHI). The EHIs goal is to involve researchers from throughout UCSF from the biological, population and translation sciences in solving and preventing the environmental burden of disease, starting with ensuring healthy pregnancies.

The EHI will link faculty across the campus, to add an environmental component to their work, Woodruff says. We have already hosted several networking events and symposia with the Research Development Office toward our goal of norming the environment within the research community. We want people to be saying, We need to address the environmental consequences to fully solve health issues.

This is about prevention, she concludes. People talk about nutrition and social competencies of health. Theres another thing, which is the physical environment. The missing ingredient is toxics in the environment.

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Toxic Exposure: Chemicals Are in Our Water, Food, Air and Furniture - University of California

Scientists Pumped Ovarian Tissue Full of Sugar and Microwaved It. Here’s Why – Smithsonian.com

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Brine shrimp have a neat trick up their sleeves. When dried out, these teeny crustaceans will fill their cells with a sugar called trehalose that suspends molecules within a glassy matrix, preserving them like fossils in amber. Heres what makes the situation even sweeter: Plop the brine shrimp into water, and theyll spring back to life, good as new.

While thats swell for brine shrimp, most other animals havent had the ability to dry their tissues into suspended animationuntil now.

Inspired by creatures like brine shrimp, Smithsonian scientists used trehaloseand a commercial microwaveto dry and preserve living cat ovarian tissue at temperatures above freezing, they report in a recent study published in PLOS ONE. Though some cells sustain damage from the dehydration process when revived, many survive and appear to retain basic functions, including transcribing their DNA in preparation for protein production.

The study is the first to show that pieces of these delicate organs, which harbor eggs in various stages of development, can be safely stored through the simple act of drying, and may remain viable in the aftermath. While the procedure is still in its early stages and has yet to move into human samples, it could someday give researchers an efficient, cost-effective way to safeguard tissues for fertility preservation, wildlife conservation and organ transplantation.

This is the first step toward long-term preservation [by drying], says Yuting (Fanny) Fan, a reproductive endocrinologist at the University of Michigan who wasnt involved in the study. Theres a long way to go before this can be used as a routine method to preserve tissue. . . but its a very innovative approach.

Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute (SCBI) researchers Pei-Chih Lee and Pierre Comizzoli designed the technique, aptly named microwave-assisted dehydration, as a potential alternative to cryopreservation, in which living tissues are cooled and stored at very low temperatures with the help of liquid nitrogen.

Cryopreservation is currently the gold standard for preserving living biomaterials for the long term, Comizzoli says. But maintaining this chill requires a lot of expensive equipment, energy and human labor, and excludes under-resourced parts of the world from utilizing the technique and burdening researchers where its widely deployed.

At its best, microwave-assisted dehydration could circumvent some of these issues. If dried into a stable state, tissues could be kept on shelvesno refrigerators or hazardous materials necessarypotentially cutting the typical cost of cryopreservation by up to 90 percent, says Comizzoli, whos been working on preserving reproductive tissues for much of his career. But technology isnt ready to support room temperature storage just yet.

A few years ago, Comizzoli and his team successfully used microwave-assisted dehydration on cat eggs and spermthe single-celled units of reproduction. The latest study, performed in complex, multicellular tissues, brings the researchers one step closer to their goal.

The method is pretty straightforward, Lee explains. After first slicing ovarian tissue into small chunks, the researchers treated the samples with a chemical that makes cells porous and flooded them with a solution of trehalose. Once the cells were full of sugar, they began the slow process of drying the tissues out in a commercial microwave set to 20 percent power.

Intermittently pulsing the tissues with microwaves steadily zapped them of their water without skyrocketing their temperature, Lee explains. As the cells dried out, the sturdy bits of trehalose cushioned them, preventing collapse.

Everything is stabilized in a glass, Comizzoli says. You suspend interactions between the molecules and their biophysical properties. . . thats how you are able to suspend life.

The tissues were then stored for about a day at 39 degrees Fahrenheitthe temperature of a standard refrigeratorbefore being rehydrated in water. (Eventually, Comizzoli would like to get the tissues stable enough to last without refrigeration.)

Lee and her colleagues tinkered with every step, including laboriously trying out different stints in the microwave. Almost across the board, the researchers were able to revitalize cells that had been dried for up to 30 minutes. Though there were some casualties, most plumped back up to their normal shape in water, and seemed to have their DNA intact.

Looking fine, however, isnt the same as working fine, and its still unclear just how functional the rehydrated cells are. The longer the tissues were microwaved, the more basic cellular processes like DNA transcriptionthe first step in protein productionwere compromised. And when ovarian tissue was dried for more than ten minutes, only a small fraction of the follicles, which contain immature eggs, survived.

Comizzoli stresses that these experiments primarily demonstrate proof-of-conceptto show that a more fine-tuned procedure would even be possible. Now that we have that, we are [trying to] improve everything, he says.

The team is already in the midst of experiments to optimize their protocol by simultaneously maximizing preservation and minimizing cell damage. Once those parameters are a little clearer, he says, theyll start testing how well the reanimated tissues perform at their intended function: reproduction.

What the team is trying to accomplish is a difficult feat, says Monica Laronda, a fertility preservation expert at Northwestern University who wasnt involved in the study. Some of the most important experiments are those yet to come, including assessing the health of tissues after much longer periods of storage. Eventually, the team will want to see if the tissues keep bouncing back in the days and weeks after resuscitationor even survive a transplant back into a living body.

If the teams success continues, the researchers ultimately plan to expand their technique into other mammalian species. At SCBI, Comizzoli and his colleagues have long been engaged in preserving and restoring the worlds biodiversity. Part of their mission is to oversee the breeding of endangered species and their subsequent reintroduction in the wildsomething that could get a huge boost from a freezer-free method for storing and transporting reproductive tissues.

Shifting into human medicine is much further out of reach, but certainly appealing. One group that could benefit immensely from the technique includes female cancer patients who need to undergo chemotherapy, a harsh procedure that often destroys fragile reproductive tissues. To safeguard their ovariesand the eggs withinsome women turn to cryopreservation to freeze the tissue while they finish treatment, Fan says. Microwave-assisted dehydration could someday offer these patients a cheaper, more convenient option.

Theres also no reason the technique couldnt be used in other tissue types, Comizzoli says.

Cooling techniques have already made their way into organ transplantation research, and the same could certainly be attempted with dehydration. If that pans out, then it might be a good thing that the first tests were in reproductive tissues, he says, because theyre the most complicated ones.

Cryopreservation is a big industry, but it doesnt have to have a monopoly over tissue preservation. Its inconvenient, Fan says. Thats why its critical to study other methods.

Theres a long way to go before microwave-assisted dehydration becomes a serious contender, but with studies like these, she says, theres already some hope.

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Scientists Pumped Ovarian Tissue Full of Sugar and Microwaved It. Here's Why - Smithsonian.com