HerpetologyFangirl

Thank you Jens, that was the precise information I was looking for. If that's the case, then I'm certain that a YY foetus would self-abort early on. That fits with my story. As sad as it is, a little angst goes a long way when you're writing fiction. Besides, the meaner I am to the characters which I love so much, the happier the endings I give them. ;-)

If anyone is interested in reading my story, you can find it in Fanfiction.net. It's called 'Tea of Fate', by AnimeOtaku4444.

"You cannot have a YY baby, the Y chromosome is missing necessary genes for the development of the foetus."

Ah! This was the clear and concise reply which I was looking for from the beginning! Short, certain, and to-the-point. Thank you very much, Moontanman. :-D

Wow, thanks for your contributions! ^.^

jp255, I don't think I'll be taking it quite that far in my story. If I get too technical, I'll start losing my audience. Sadly they aren't all scientists like us. Heck, even I'm a little fuzzy on my knowledge of imprinting patterns. I was just personally curious about what a YY baby would be like.

Well, my story and the medicine is more magic than science, so I suppose I could make a YY baby viable if I really wanted to, but I much prefer to be accurate where I can. Besides, what kind of life would the overly-masculine boy have? Would he even be able to have kids of his own when he was old enough? Only sons, if it was possible at all.

As a 'what if' thinker, I can't help but map out all of the possibilities in my mind, and look for the most interesting results of my musings. Thank you so much everyone, for indulging me like this! I really appreciate it.

Ewmon is thinking in the right direction. Like I mentioned before, when the guy drinks the medicine some of his sperm cells are changed into proper egg cells, only the DNA in the gamete stays the same, so the new egg cells would have all the mitochondria they needed. The real question is, could a foetus develop and be viable without an X chromosome?

In my story, taking the special medicine makes several changes to the male's body, in order to make him capable of conceiving and safely carrying a baby, such as converting a few hundred thousand sperm cells into egg cells (but not altering the DNA, which is why some eggs would have Y sex genes, thus making a YY baby possible) Also, things like making the pelvic bone more feminine, so he won't start walking funny when his baby bump grows in, etc.

Given this information, would the foetus really have no mitochondria? Wouldn't that make it non-viable, and cause a miscarriage?

Okay, so we all know that women have XX chromosomes, and men have XY sex genes. Occassionally something will go wrong, and people will be born who are XXY or XXX. These are facts.

At the moment, I'm writing a fanfiction for Naruto, the anime. It's all purely fiction, and as such, certain liberties are being taken. There's a comparatively small subgenre of fanfiction called 'mpreg', where one of the male characters, usually a male in a gay relationship, somehow falls pregnant. In my story it's made possible through the consumption of a special medicine. It's more magic than science, but being a scientist myself, I can't help but think about some of the possible consequences of a male x male pregnancy.

For example, in such a situation it would be possible for a YY baby to be conceived. There'd be a 25% chance of such an occurence with each conception. I would really like to hear your thoughts on how such a baby might develop, what sort of deformities it might have, whether or not such a foetus could even survive to term, or if it would more likely miscarry early on.

Please humor my curiosity. It is, after all, the mark of a scientist.

I just love scientific logic. Being a nerd is such fun. :-D You guys sound like Sheldon, Leonard, Wolowitz, and Koothrappali having an argument. Although a couple of you sound like Penny. X-D This is better than TV.

Hi, I'm making a glossary as part of a group project, and I need a definition or description of this term. My group-mate swears blind that it is in fact a word, and I've seen it come up in web searches, but I can't for the life of me find anything helpful. Does anybody have any suggestions?

Can anyone tell me what the window quantity is exactly? My tablets are 200 Micrograms. What does Selenium dioxide do? What makes it so dangerous? Can anybody recommend a safer antioxidant? And what is a brazil nut? I eat a snackbox consisting of 30 raisins, 10 cashews, 5 pecans, and 10 almonds every day. I make them myself. I find my snackboxes are excellent for the digestion system.

I recently started taking Selenium in addition to my other supplements. It's an antioxidant which is supposed to greatly reduce the chances of me getting cancer. Would anyone care to comment on that?

Okay, this is going to sound disgustingly ignorant of me, but what is the uvula, and if I open my mouth wide, will I be able to see it somewhere back there? The epiglotis is the thing that hangs down at the back of your throat, right?

That's some good advice, thank you. I take Centrum, which is a low-dose multivitamin, and additional Iron in a 'high' dose. Altogether I get about half my daily limit of Iron from my supplements, and I mean 'limit', not 'recommended dosage'. I looked it up on the internet, and I found that the highest ammount of Iron an adult woman can take before it starts becoming unhealthy is 45mg. I get 23mg per day, 8 from my Centrum, and 15 from my additional Iron supplement. On days when I feel like I'm going to faint, like when I've recently donated blood, and then my fertility cycle kicks in, I might take two Iron tablets, but I only do that on rare occassion, never more than once a month, because I know it takes the body longer than with most vitamins to get rid of excess iron.

It would be interesting to do some experiments, fitting an aircraft with every technology available, including a device for detecting turbulence, and sending them into the Burmuda Triangle... Then again, some say the triangle's mysterious forces mess with technology and put it all out of wack. It would still be interesting though.

Those look amazing! Have you been able to identify any of them at all? What do you think they were used for?

Maybe God is as much a scientist as we are, and we were just one of his experiments? The Bible seems to say something along the lines of, originally we were perfectly moral beings, but then we were corrupted by Satan and we went from a 10 to a 5. Of course, that begs the question, if we were corruptible in the first place, does that mean we weren't perfectly moral at all?

O.o Damn... My mind is utterly boggled... No wonder I failed my first-year Physics class... O.o

I think it should stay legal. Married people should be able to trust their spouses, otherwise what would the point of marriage be? Besides, passwords are there for a reason, and if you have something to hide, you can always change your password if you've previously given it to your spouse, then changed your mind later. And people shouldn't be keeping secrets and cheating on their spouses anyway. It serves them right if they get caught.

Thanks for that link, Cap'n. I checked it out, and that certainly seems to fit my symptoms. I'll ask my doctor about it the next time I see him, as everyone has suggested. I always thought it had something to do with my blood pressure being low from being in a relaxed state, and then having insufficient time to adjust when I stood up. Also, as a teen I often had blood pressure lower than average. Thanks for the advice and suggestions you've offered, everyone.

Hello. I'm not sure this website is the most appropriate place for this post, but I couldn't find anywhere else. If this thread is deleted, I'll understand. But getting to the point... For years now, since I was about 9 years old, I've been getting these 'episodes'. I described the symptoms to a lady at the blood bank once, and she knew exactly what I was talking about, she even said that she had the same problem, and she told me what it was called, but that was months ago, and I've forgotten it. I got very upset today because I was talking about it with my sister after I had a mild episode in front of her, and she told me that when I have my episodes it looks like I'm just acting, over-exagerating, or having panic or anxiety attacks, and I know that's not what it is. I was very offended that she thought those things, and that she even had the nerve to repeatedly insist that I was a hypochondriac, which I've never been accused of before. I told her about the lady at the blood bank, but she was laughing, and I don't think she believed me. That made me desperately want to find the name of my condition. I'll describe the symptoms, and if anybody can help me, I'd vastly appreciate it.

My episodes usually occur when I've been resting, napping, or sleeping for a long time, and I suddenly get up and start walking, or doing some activity. I'll start shaking uncontrollably, my whole body. It's frightening because it feels like I'm going to fall over. When that happens I try to lie down or lean heavily on a table or something. I feel light headed, I have trouble breathing because I start to hyperventilate slightly, and I stare straight ahead at thin air, but I can't really see anything. It doesn't affect my hearing, and it usually only lasts about 30 seconds. I've found that sometimes twisting around to the left and the right a few times lessens the severity, or shortens the episode, and helps prevent the shaking. Otherwise I just try to take deep breaths until it passes.

If you know anything about this, I'd appreciate any comments or information. Thank you.

That was the worst video I've ever watched. Whoever made it clearly didn't know the first thing about salt-water crocs and great whites. They should be drawn and quatered for allowing such rubbish to be shown on a respectable channel like Discovery. *shakes head*

Wow Imatfaal, you've got one heck of a point there. ^.^

^.^ Well, I certainly do fall into the category of worry warts. ^.^

Thanks for the advice insane_alien. I agree that a continuous scale would be more accurate, but for me, when I'm doing it quickly, and most questions fall into a grey area rather than a black-and-white situation, it's easier for me to fit my answers into one of these three basic categories. By the way, I just got the last of my exam results back. I predicted a 63 for Biochemistry & Microbiology, and I got 61. ^.^ :-D There will be grand celebrations this summer. No Supplementary exams! Yay! *tosses hat in the air, then scrambles to grab it off the floor while blushing at everybody in the LAN staring at me*

Thanks for your helpful, insightful comments which is what I was after in the first place. I usually aim to get at least 10% higher than I actually need to with my predictions, to account for any errors, or bad luck.

I'm a total otaku, I can't even count the number of animes I've watched. I have a few favourites as well, but here's the short list:

1. Ah! My Goddess

2. Angelic Layer

3. Azumanga Daioh

4. Bleach

5. Chrome Shelled Regios

6. Fruits Basket

7. Full Metal Panic

8. Ghost Hunt

9. InuYasha

10. Lovely Complex

11. Mai Hime

12. Naruto

13. Nodame Cantabile

14. Onegai Teacher

15. One Piece

16. Ouran High School Host Club

17. Prince Of Tennis

18. Ranma

19. Rounin Kenshin

20. Soul Eater

21. Steel Angel Kurumi

22. Torodora

23. Trinity Blood

24. Vampire Knight

25. Wallflower

Yikes... I guess that wasn't such a short list after alll, but I truely loved them all, this is as much as I can narrow it down.