GenderLife Forum: The Information Exchange

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/scienc...ne-1838170.html

An interesting article. no that's an understatement. A VERY INTERESTING article.

GREAT article, Allison, thank you. Hugs, Rachel

Very interesting

Is this a put-on? I see that the two genes being studied are FoxL2 in females and Sox9 in males. Fox and Sox?? Perhaps one of the researchers was Dr. Seuss.

Hey! Scientists read Dr. Suess too ya know!

Dr. Seuss was transsexual?

There is a reason for the -ox ending in genes encoding for transcription factors. Most have something called a "homeobox," a sequence of DNA that encodes a protein "finger" that folds in such a fashion as to anchor the factor to the point where it exerts influence (activating or repressing a certain gene).

sox is the sex-determining transcription factors with an homeobox.

fox is the organ-formation transcription factors with an homeobox.

Usually, the name of the gene is in lower-case and italics, the name of the mRNA coded by it is in lower case (often preceded by an (m)), and the name of the protein is capitalized. A family name is written all in capitals.

So, soxA is a particular gene (the A indicating which one in the family it is, is capitalized), (m)soxA is its mRNA and SoxA is its protein. But often the literature calls the soxA the "SRY region" --until recently they were not sure whether it was only one gene or more.

Ah, and of course SOX is the family of genes that code for transcription factors that regulate sex determination in the zygote/embryo.

Interesting article. So "Bones" may have been right about all this barbaric 21st century medicine.

Of course he was!

I like my explanation better.

Biochemists do have a sense of humour, so my guess is that the explanation came after the idea. Although hox was the first following that pattern, I can see how having the -ox ending at hand was too tempting.

Then there's the gene linked to athletic ability - jox.
And there's the tracer gene for Jewish ancestry - lox.

Oh lox... yum! Love the stuff.

Once, during a breakfast of bagels and cream cheese and lox, an English friend of mine asked for "a lock". After a good deal of laughter we filled her in on the actual term, Lox!

Wow, this is very interesting! Though clearly this technology would not allow us to have biological children, I think this could be a first step in that direction, once we know what we're doing. It reminds of some of the trans erotica I used to read (only the ones with happy endings mind you).

I'm 27 and nowhere near ready for SRS, so I have some hope of if not being carryinbg a my child, then at least having to avoid the castration part of SRS; I'd be nice to have my testicles become ovaries. It just seems a lot more wonderful that way.

Well,that technology won"t do me any good.Mine are sitting out in a waste dump somewhere out there.I"ve been keeping my fingers crossed that they don"t find their way back home .

God I'm glad I didn't read that while drinking something or that something would be all over the screen now. From the nose mind you.

How about "From Mickey to Minnie"? Huh?