Scientists Attach Bar Codes To Embryos 69
Zothecula writes "Fans of the film Blade Runner may remember a scene in which the maker of an artificial snake is identified by a microscopic serial number on one of its scales. Well, in a rare case of present-day technology actually surpassing that predicted in a movie, we've now gone one better — bar codes on embryos. Scientists from Spain's Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB), along with colleagues from the Spanish National Research Council, have successfully developed an identification system in which mouse embryos and oocytes (egg cells) are physically tagged with microscopic silicon bar code labels. They expect to try it out on human embryos and oocytes soon."
Re:Is this where... (Score:5, Informative)
A tinfoil hat won't save you from the embryo bar code! The fact that you're not an embryo and have no zona pellucida will. Read the very short article: these are tagged onto the outside of the embryo. The embryo hatches out of it prior to attaching to the uterine wall, the tag is lost at that point. This is not like imprinting organisms from conception to adulthood, despite the tone of the summary.
Mod parent up (Score:4, Informative)
And here's a link:
http://indianapublicmedia.org/amomentofscience/barcoding-wild-salmon [indianapublicmedia.org]
Re:Is this where... (Score:3, Informative)
DNA Barcode... Is DNA not unique to individuals? Why not just take a sample of everyone's DNA at birth instead of barcoding it or are there too many people claiming in court "It wasn't me. It was my evil twin" and getting away with it
not really, for example twins have the same DNA
Re:The End Times and Christian eschatology (Score:3, Informative)
Yes, the tags are only there to help identify the egg so that mix-ups don't happen when fertilising them. There was a case a few years ago in the UK where two couple's eggs got mixed up resulting in each mother having the child of the other's partner.
I don't know if sperm can be tagged in the same way but at least this would reduce the chances of a mistake by 50%.
Re:Is this where... (Score:3, Informative)
not really, for example twins have the same DNA
Don't even identical twins both have single bit errors that the other doesn't?