Frances Pen Out With Mom

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First time mom Amanda Peet has a good laugh with 1year old daughter Frances Pen.

Frances rides comfortably in the blue and green lined ergo baby carrier. This carrier is popular with parents because its design supports a correct sitting position for the baby’s hip, pelvis and spine growth. It disperses most of the baby’s weight between the hips and thighs, which helps to eliminate compression of the spine when hanging by the crotch which most other designs require.

PHOTOCREDIT:FLYNETONLINE.COM VIA USMAGAZINE

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Baby Making – Without Men!

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Wolfgang Engel, M.D., Ph.D., Director of the Department of Human Genetics at the Faculty of Medicine, University of Göttingen, Germany, is researching ways to actually grow sperm in the lab.

His research has led to the first live births of mice from sperm created in the lab. His team has already produced live mice generated from sperm that was grown out of embryonic stem cells. It was a major step forward, but a sperm cell from an embryonic stem cell would still not give an infertile man a biological tie to his child. It wouldn’t be any different than using donor sperm from a sperm bank, which has been done for years. To give a man a biological tie, Engel’s team is now generating sperm from very early germ cells taken from the testicles.

Engel says, “If it works in the mouse, I’m sure it will also work in the human.” Another possibility, says Engel, is to try and generate viable sperm cells using stem cells in bone marrow.

The crazy part – Engel believes that it could be possible to take early germ cells from one woman, turn them into sperm cells, and use those to fertilize the egg of another woman.

Says Engel, “It’s very nice to have a woman and to have a man … but it might be possible in the future, perhaps you are able to get a child from two women.”

Controversy comes with all groundbreaking research, especially when procreation is involved. Ken Goodman, Ph.D., a philosopher from the University of Miami makes this point:

“The point at which you want to use a [lab-grown] sperm cell to actually make a baby — to reproduce a human being as part of an experiment, you hit what I think is a wall. If you are creating a human being as part of the experiment, then by definition, you can’t get consent from that human being. Research that uses stem-cell derived sperm for reproduction is not going to be ethically permissible.”

SOURCE

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Rugby Star Ben Cohen Tries To Remake Iconic Poster

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The dailymail has some great shots of rugby star Ben Cohen with his twins.

The 29-year-old former England rugby star was hoping to recreate an updated version of the classic sepia image of man and child that sold five million Athena posters in the 1980s.

The only problem was when the five-month-olds Isabelle and Harriett refused to play ball.

It took three hours to come up with the final shot of him holding Isabelle, who decided to co-operate for just long enough.

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Could A 6 Minute Catnap Fix Your Mommy Brain?

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Since having my son over 2 years ago, I have noticed my memory deteriorate significantly. I sometimes joke that my little guy took my memory for himself because his ability to remember things is unbelievable.

MSNBC has an interesting article, that covers a new study just released on “power naps.”

German researchers have shown that if you nap just six sublime minutes during the day, it will not only make you feel better but will also improve your ability to learn and remember.

The connection between sleep and learning is something that researchers have only recently pinpointed, but many people know from their own experience — such as the mathematician who says he’s going to sleep on a problem and has a Eureka! moment upon nodding off.

Researchers go on to say that:

During sleep, the brain “gets rid of what you don’t need so that during the next period of wakefulness, you’re ready to acquire more information.”

Can you believe that I could possibly get my brain back between 3:00 and 3:06? It sounds too good to be true…

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