User:Z3374215

Lab Attendance

Lab 1 --Z3374215 11:49, 25 July 2012 (EST)

Lab 2 --Z3374215 10:06, 1 August 2012 (EST)

Lab 1 Assessment

1) Identify the origin of In Vitro Fertilization and the 2010 nobel prize winner associated with this technique and add a correctly formatted link to the Nobel page.

The Nobel Prize for physiology or medicine in 2010 was awarded to Robert G. Edwards for his efforts in the development of In Vitro fertilization. Robert G. Edwards developed the idea of In Vitro fertilization since the 1950s. He first made fundamental discoveries in the life cycles of human eggs and the optimal time for fertilization before pairing with a gynecologist, Patrick Steptoe, and eventually seeing to the successful birth of an IVF baby in 1978. .

2) Identify and add a PubMed reference link to a recent paper on fertilisation and describe its key findings (1-2 paragraphs). "The relative contributions of propulsive forces and receptor-ligand binding forces during early contact between spermatozoa and zona pellucida of oocyte" was published by the Journal of Theoretical Biology in Nov. 2011 . This report discusses the two main ways in which spermatozoa penetrate the zona pellucida of oocytes. The sperm utilize propulsive forces to assist in penetration. This is achieved through the motion of the flagella. The other factor important to penetration is the binding of sperm to ligands on the surface of the zona pellucida of the oocyte (ZP3). The report addresses the question of which of the cofactors is most imperative to the successful fertilization of the oocyte. A biomechanical model of the sperm-oocyte process was developed. It predicted that during early penetration the propulsive forces were stronger than the biochemical ligand binding. It was also predicted that the constant movement and overpowering force of the propulsion of sperm would make binding to ZP3 ligands difficult, making the large number of ZP3 receptors on the head of the sperm significantly important at this early stage.

References