Sperm donation

 

Sperm donation is the provision by a man of his sperm with the intention that it be used in the artificial insemination or other "fertility treatment" of one or more women who are not his sexual partners in order that they may become pregnant by him. Where pregnancies go to full term, the sperm donor will be the biological father of every baby born from his donations.

The man is known as a sperm donor and the sperm he provides is known as "donor sperm" because the intention is that the man will give up all legal rights to any child produced from his sperm, and will not be the legal father.

Continue

Egg donation

Egg donation is the process by which a woman donates eggs to enable another woman to conceive as part of an assisted reproduction treatment or for biomedical research. For assisted reproduction purposes, egg donation typically involves in vitro fertilization technology, with the eggs being fertilized in the laboratory; more rarely, unfertilized eggs may be frozen and stored for later use. Egg donation is a third party reproduction as part of assisted reproductive technology.

Reasons for Egg donation 

A need for egg donation may arise for a number of reasons. Infertile couples may resort to egg donation when the female partner cannot have genetic children because her own eggs cannot generate a viable pregnancy, or because they could generate a viable pregnancy but the chances are so low that it is not advisable or financially feasible to do IVF with her own eggs. This situation is often, but not always based on advanced reproductive age. It can also be due to early onset of menopause, which can occur as early as their 20s. In addition, some women are born without ovaries, while some women's reproductive organs have been damaged or surgically removed due to disease or other circumstances. Another indication would be a genetic disorder on part of the woman that either renders her infertile or would be dangerous for any offspring, problems that can be circumvented by using eggs from another woman. Many women have none of these issues, but continue to be unsuccessful using their own eggs—in other words, they have undiagnosed infertility—and thus turn to donor eggs or donor embryos. As stated above, egg donation is also helpful for gay male couples using surrogacy .

Procedure

After being recruited and screened, an egg donor must give informed consent before participating in the IVF process. Once the egg donor is recruited, she undergoes IVF stimulation therapy, followed by the egg retrieval procedure. After retrieval, the ova are fertilized by the sperm of the male partner (or sperm donor) in the laboratory, and, after several days, the best resulting embryo(s) is/are placed in the uterus of the recipient, whose uterine lining has been appropriately prepared for embryo transfer beforehand. If a large number of viable embryos are generated, they can be cryopreserved for future implantation attempts. The recipient is usually, but not always, the person who requested the service and then will carry and deliver the pregnancy and keep the baby.

Medical Examination of donar,s

Before any intensive medical, psychological, or genetic testing is done on a donor,their physical and temperamental resemblance to the recipient woman). This is due to the fact that all of the mentioned examinations are expensive and the agencies must first confirm that a match is possible or guaranteed before investing in the process.

The donor is then required to undergo a thorough medical examination, including a pelvic exam, a blood test to evaluate hormone levels(notably Anti-Müllerian hormone), infection risk, Rh factor, blood type, and drug use, and an ultrasound to examine her ovaries, uterus and other pelvic organs. A family history of approximately the past three generations is also required, meaning that adoptees are usually not accepted because of the lack of past health knowledge. Genetic testing is also usually done on donors to ensure that they do not carry mutations (e.g., cystic fibrosis) that could harm the resulting children; however, not all clinics automatically perform such testing and thus recipients must clarify with their clinics whether such testing will be done.

Donation cycle

Once the screening is complete and a legal contract signed, the donor will begin the donation cycle, which typically takes between three and six weeks. An egg retrieval procedure comprises both the Egg Donor's Cycle and the Recipient's Cycle. Birth control pills are administered during the first few weeks of the egg donation process to synchronize the donor's cycle with the recipient's, followed by a series of injections which halt the normal functioning of the donor's ovaries. These injections may be self-administered on a daily basis for a period of one to three weeks. Next, follicle-stimulating hormones (FSH) are given to the donor to stimulate egg production and increases the number of mature eggs produced by the ovaries. Throughout the cycle the donor is monitored often by a physician using blood tests and ultrasound exams to determine the donor's reaction to the hormones and the progress of follicle growth.

Once the doctor decides the follicles are mature, they will establish the date and time for the egg retrieval procedure. Approximately 36 hours before retrieval, the donor must administer one last injection of HCG hormone to ensure that her eggs are ready to be harvested. This hormone will produce a LH hormone concentration peak and induce follicular development. The oocytes are then retrieved from developed follicles via ovarian punction. This extraction must occur before ovulation, as oocytes are too small to be identified once they leave the follicle, and if the appropriate time window is missed the donation cycle will need to be repeated.

The egg retrieval itself is a minimally invasive surgical procedure lasting 20–30 minutes, performed under sedation by an anesthetist, to ensure the donor is kept completely pain free. Egg donors may also be advised to take a pain-relieving medicine one hour before egg collection, to ensure minimum discomfort after the procedure. A small ultrasound-guided needle is inserted through the vagina to aspirate the follicles in both ovaries, which extracts the eggs. After resting in a recovery room for an hour or two, the donor is released. Most donors resume regular activities by the next day.

History

The first child born from egg donation was reported in Australia in 1983. In July 1983, a clinic in Southern California reported a pregnancy using egg donation, which led to the birth of the first American child born from egg donation on 3 February 1984. This procedure was performed at the Harbor UCLA Medical Center and the University of California at Los Angeles School of Medicine. In the procedure, which is no longer used today, a fertilized egg that was just beginning to develop was transferred from one woman in whom it had been conceived by artificial insemination to another woman who gave birth to the infant 38 weeks later. The sperm used in the artificial insemination came from the husband of the woman who bore the baby.

Before this development, thousands of infertile women, single men and same-sex male couples had adoption as the only path to parenthood. The donation of human oocytes and embryos has since become a common practice similar to other donations such as blood and major organ donations. The practice of egg donation has sparked media attention and public debate, and has had a substantial impact on the field of reproductive medicine.

This scientific breakthrough changed the possibilities for those who were unable to have children due to female infertility and for those at high risk for passing on hereditary disorders. As IVF developed, the procedures used in egg donation developed in parallel: the egg donor's eggs are now harvested from her ovaries in an outpatient surgical procedure and fertilized in the laboratory, the same procedure used on IVF patients. The resulting embryo or embryos are then transferred into the intended mother instead of into the woman who provided the egg. Donor oocytes thus give women a mechanism to become pregnant and give birth to a child that will be their biological child, but not their genetic child. In cases where the recipient's womb is absent or unable to carry a pregnancy, or in cases involving gay male couples, the embryos are implanted into a gestational surrogate, who carries the embryo to term, per an agreement with the future parents. The combination of egg donation and surrogacy has enabled gay men, including singer Elton John and his partner, to have biological children. Oocyte and embryo donation now account for approximately 18% of in vitro fertilization recorded births in the US.

This work established the technical foundation and legal-ethical framework surrounding the clinical use of human oocyte and embryo donation, a mainstream clinical practice, which has evolved over the past few decades.

Continue

Egg Freezing or Oocyte Cryopreservation

Egg freezing is a method of preserving a woman’s fertility so she can try and have children at a later date. 

Firstly, you’ll need to be tested for any infectious diseases like HIV and hepatitis. This has no bearing on whether you can freeze your eggs or not, but is to ensure that affected egg samples are stored separately to prevent contamination of other samples.

You'll then start the IVF process, which usually takes around two to three weeks to complete. Normally this will involve taking drugs to boost your egg production and help the eggs mature. When they’re ready, they’ll be collected whilst you’re under general anaesthetic or sedation.

At this point, instead of mixing the eggs with sperm (as in conventional IVF) a cryoprotectant (freezing solution) will be added to protect the eggs. The eggs will then be frozen either by cooling them slowly or by vitrification (fast freezing) and stored in tanks of liquid nitrogen. Latest statistics show that vitrification is more successful than the slow cooling method.

Most patients under 38 years of age will have on around 7-14 eggs collected, although this isn’t always possible for patients with low ovarian reserves (low numbers of eggs). When you want to use them, the eggs will be thawed and those that have survived intact will be injected with your partner’s or donor’s sperm.

Preparation 

Before the egg-freezing process begins, a doctor will take a comprehensive medical history with a focus on fertility, assess the regularity of the menstrual cycle, and perform a range of blood tests to assess hormone levels.

A woman’s ovaries usually release one egg per month. When fewer eggs are available for freezing, the chances of a successful pregnancy are lower.

In order to maximize the number of available eggs, a woman will undergo hormone treatment to stimulate the production of more eggs. This treatment normally requires a woman to inject herself with hormones at home between one and three times a day.

Most women will also take birth control pills for at least a month before receiving the hormone injections. This suppresses the natural cycle and increases the effectiveness of the hormones.

The number and type of hormones vary. Treatment will normally include:

around 2 weeks of injections with follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH) and luteinizing hormone (LH), which encourage the ovaries to produce more eggsan injection of gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) about halfway through the cycle, which prevents ovulation from taking place too early in the cyclean injection of human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG) to trigger ovulation.

A doctor will perform regular blood tests to monitor the effects of hormone treatments. The woman will also have at least one ultrasound to detect ovulation and to assess egg development.

Procedure

The steps of egg freezing or oocyte cryopreservation are:

Ovarian stimulation: begins with transvaginal ultrasound examination and blood tests to determine the number of oocytes and ovarian function and administering ovarian-stimulation medication for 9-12 days. The doses required vary among patients, depending on their ovarian functions. Follow-up ultrasounds will see whether the egg size and number meet the specifications. If it is, administering another medication will help the eggs mature.

Egg retrieval: is performed by transvaginal ultrasound-guided needle aspiration and suction to harvest the eggs from the follicles. 

Simply The doctor inserts a needle into the ovarian follicles to retrieve the eggs after they ripen.

It is a minor procedure performed under IV sedation given by an anesthesiologist. Patients must not eat or drink for at least 8 hours before the procedure. Egg retrieval takes around 30-45 minutes, depending on the number of retrievable oocytes.

The doctor will normally use ultrasound to guide the procedure. However, if the eggs are not visible during ultrasound imaging, the doctor may perform abdominal surgery to remove them.

With this more invasive approach, the doctor makes a small incision in the abdomen under sedation and pain medication and inserts a needle to extract the egg.

An embryologist selects healthy eggs for freezing: Once the doctor has retrieved the egg, freezing will need to take place as soon as possible. However, the eggs are full of water, which can become damaging ice crystals if freezing occurs immediately.

To prevent this, the doctor injects a special solution into the eggs before freezing them.

In the future, when the woman is ready to use her eggs, she will undergo in vitro fertilization (IVF).

With IVF, a fertility specialist fertilizes the egg in a lab, using sperm from either the woman’s partner or from a donor.

If the procedure works, the egg and sperm develop into an embryo that undergoes implantation in the woman’s uterus a few days later. Most fertility clinics try to grow several embryos at once to increase the chances of a successful pregnancy.

Advantages of egg freezing or oocyte cryopreservation

• Suitable for women who want to freeze their eggs for future in vitro fertilization when they are ready for pregnancy.
• Suitable for those who want to freeze their eggs before chemotherapy or radiotherapy, which can damage the ovaries.
• Suitable for those with genetic disorders causing premature ovarian failure, or those with ovarian dysfunction such as chocolate cyst.
• To treat infertility with IVF. If the male partner has ejaculation problems or produces no sperm on the day of egg retrieval, freeze the eggs for future use.
• To freeze the eggs for donation.

Reasons that women freeze their eggs

Some major reasons

Career and educational plans: Women who wish to pursue advanced degrees or demanding careers may freeze their eggs when they are young to ensure access to healthy eggs later on.

Personal circumstances: Women who want to have a child with a partner but have not yet found one may freeze their eggs for future use.

Cancer: Chemotherapy and other cancer treatments typically interfere with and sometimes end fertility. Reproductive cancers might lead to the removal of a woman’s ovaries.

Egg freezing might help reduce the impact of some cancer treatments on fertility.

Infections, organ failure, and other health concerns: A wide range of health problems can harm egg quality and fertility, such as endometriosis, a condition that causes uterine tissue to grow outside of the womb.

Freezing eggs offers hope to women who are receiving treatment for a serious illness that may reduce fertility.

WHY FREEZE YOUR EGGS BEFORE YOUR 30s

Younger women have significantly higher success rates than older women when freezing eggs.

Women who wish to undergo egg freezing should do so as early as possible.

An optimal time to freeze your eggs is in your 20s and early 30s, while you have a higher ovarian reserve (the number of eggs in your ovaries) and healthier eggs. Sometimes the future seems a long way off. While you focus on your career, finding the right partner or addressing medical issues, time can run out.

Most clinics work with women who are under 40 years old. Some clinics place restrictions on women who are 40–49 years of age. Few will allow women over the age of 45 years to freeze their eggs.

Whatever your reasons, if you think you might want a family someday but aren’t ready right now or in the near future, egg freezing gives you the choice to decide when the time is right for you.

Successful Fertilization Rates of Frozen Eggs

The success rate depends on the quantity and quality of the eggs and their ages. Usually, the survival rate of frozen-thawed oocytes is around 80-90%. The success rate of fertilization is 70-80%. After successful fertilization, the embryo will let growing for another five days, reaching the blastocyst stage, which is suitable for implantation. The success rate of development to the blastocyst stage is around 60%.

How longs eggs can be stored

Recent legislation changes in the UK mean that the amount of time that you can store frozen eggs has been extended from 10 to 55 years.

Although you can now store eggs for later use up to a maximum of 55 years from when they are first placed in storage, you will need to renew your consent every ten years. You will need to fill out a consent form, and if you need to renew your consent, you will be kept up to date by the clinic where your eggs are stored. For this reason, you need to keep your contact details up to date with the clinic, or there’s a risk of your eggs being taken out of storage and disposed of.

From a technical perspective, frozen eggs can be stored for an indefinite amount of time. Once eggs are frozen, are stored in liquid nitrogen at a very low temperature, which means that they do not age or deteriorate over time. This allows them to be stored for long periods of time without losing their viability.

You shouldn’t have to pay the entire egg freezing storage cost up front, but you will need to continue to pay for egg storage over time or your clinic might dispose of eggs where storage has not been paid for. 

Cost of egg freezing

The cost of egg freezing can vary depending on a number of factors, including where you live, the clinic you choose, and the reason you are freezing your eggs. You can only freeze eggs at the NHS’s expense if you need to do so for medical reasons. On the NHS, freezing eggs for social reasons will not be paid for and you will need to fund this yourself.

Costs will include an initial consultation, hormone treatments to stimulate egg production, the egg retrieval procedure, and the cost of freezing and storing the eggs. It’s important to discuss the costs with your doctor and the clinic you choose in advance to make sure that you are aware of all the costs that are involved, and to get a better idea of what to expect.

Freeze and share programme

Most of the countries have Freeze and share programmes like UK .

Freeze and Share makes it possible for you to freeze your eggs for free because you keep half the eggs retrieve for your own later use and make the other half available to give another family the chance to have a baby of their own.

Offer of free freezing eggs may be for time limit like mostly two years to five years.

Continue

Surrogacy

 

Surrogacy is an arrangement, often supported by a legal agreement, whereby a woman agrees to delivery/labour or Carrier on behalf of another couple or person, who will become the child's parent(s) after birth. People may seek a surrogacy arrangement when a couple do not wish to carry a pregnancy themselves, when pregnancy is medically impossible, when pregnancy risks are dangerous for the intended mother, or when a single man or a male couple wish to have a child.

Continue

Cultured meat (Lab grown meat)

Cultured meat (also known by other names like lab grown meat , artificial meat is occasionally used) is meat produced by culturing animal cells in vitro. It is a form of cellular agriculture.

Lab-grown meat or Cultured meat is a genetically engineered product that uses biotechnology. 

Cultured meat is produced using tissue engineering techniques pioneered in regenerative medicine. Jason Matheny popularized the concept in the early 2000s after he co-authored a paper on cultured meat production and created New Harvest, the world's first nonprofit organization dedicated to in-vitro meat research.

Cultured meat has the potential to address the environmental impact of meat production, animal welfare, food security and human health, in addition to its potential mitigation of climate change.

In 2013, Mark Post created a hamburger patty made from tissue grown outside of an animal. Since then, other cultured meat prototypes have gained media attention: SuperMeat opened a farm-to-fork restaurant called "The Chicken" in Tel Aviv to test consumer reaction to its "Chicken" burger, while the "world's first commercial sale of cell-cultured meat" occurred in December 2020 at Singapore restaurant 1880, where cultured meat manufactured by US firm Eat Just was sold.

While most efforts focus on common meats such as pork, beef, and chicken which constitute the bulk of consumption in developed countries, companies such as Orbillion Bio focused on high end or unusual meats including elk, lamb, bison, and Wagyu beef. Avant Meats brought cultured grouper to market in 2021, while other companies have pursued different species of fish and other seafood.

The production process is constantly evolving, driven by companies and research institutions. The applications for cultured meat led to ethical, health, environmental, cultural, and economic discussions. Data published by the non-governmental organization Good Food Institute found that in 2021 cultivated meat companies attracted $140 million in Europe. Cultured meat is mass-produced in Israel. The first restaurant to serve cultured meat opened in Singapore in 2021.

Nomenclature 

Besides cultured meat, the terms healthy meat, slaughter-free meat, in vitro meat, vat-grown meat, lab-grown meat,cell-based meat, clean meat, cultivated meat and synthetic meat have been used to describe the product. Artificial meat is occasionally used, although that specific term has multiple definitions.

Why was need felt for cultured meat

70 billion land animals, and possibly trillions of marine animals, are killed for human consumption each year. A majority of these animals are raised in factory farms, where they experience brutal forms of abuse in severely overcrowded and putrid conditions for the entirety of their short lives.

Major meat producers often defend factory farming as the most efficient way to meet the global demand for meat. But evidence shows that these facilities are disastrous for the environment, nearby communities, consumer health, and animal welfare.

It shouldn’t have to be this way. It's time to fix our broken food system. It's time to look for alternatives. Lab-grown meat could hold the key.

bs are only involved now, in order to support ongoing research and development. Once they begin to produce at scale, lab-grown meat companies will swap out laboratories for facilities that resemble microbreweries—a far cry from the industrial farms that profit off of the horrific exploitation, abuse, and slaughter of sentient .

Environmental effects 

The scientific research is clear: factory farming is an environmental disaster. The industrial farming of animals is a major driver of climate change, deforestation, air and water pollution, and other planetary hazards.

Industrial livestock systems – particularly cattle farms – are responsible for the emission of huge quantities of greenhouse gases like CO₂ and methane. But growing meat from cells can have a similar – and sometimes even worse – environmental footprint.

How is lab grown meat made

Instead of killing animals for their meat, the process of making lab-grown meat starts with the careful removal of a small number of muscle cells from a living animal, typically using local anesthesia to provide relief from pain. The animal will experience a momentary twinge of discomfort, not unlike the feeling of getting a routine blood test at the doctor’s office. This process is much less harmful than the lifetime of pain and terror animals experience leading up to their horrific final moments at the slaughter house.

Lab grown meat has the exact same animal cells as what we traditionally consider “meat”—the flesh of an animal. The difference has to do with how it gets to your plate: lab-grown meat comes from cells harvested from a living animal, while conventional meat comes from an animal that’s raised and killed for human consumption.

Then, a lab technician places the harvested cells in bioreactors before adding them to a bath of nutrients. The cells grow and multiply, producing real muscle tissue, which scientists then shape into edible “scaffoldings.” Using these scaffoldings, they can transform lab-grown cells into steak, chicken nuggets, hamburger patties, or salmon sashimi. The final product is a real cut of meat, ready to be marinated, breaded, grilled, baked, or fried—no animal slaughter required.

First public trial 

The first cultured beef burger patty was created by Mark Post at Maastricht University in 2013.[54] It was made from over 20,000 thin strands of muscle tissue, cost over $300,000 and needed 2 years to produce.

The burger was tested on live television in London on 5 August 2013. It was cooked by chef Richard McGeown of Couch's Great House Restaurant, Polperro, Cornwall, and tasted by critics Hanni Rützler, a food researcher from the Future Food Studio, and Josh Schonwald. Rützler stated, "There is really a bite to it, there is quite some flavour with the browning. I know there is no fat in it so I didn't really know how juicy it would be, but there is quite some intense taste; it's close to meat, it's not that juicy, but the consistency is perfect. This is meat to me... It's really something to bite on and I think the look is quite similar." Rützler added that even in a blind trial she would have taken the product for meat rather than a soya copy.

Lab grown meat effects

Some scientists and their research shows some concerns about Meat produced from cultured cells could be 25 times worse for the climate than regular beef unless scientists find ways to overhaul energy-intensive steps in its production.

Some researchers speculate that depending on the efficiency of the production process, the rise of the cultured meat industry could actually make climate change worse than traditional beef production. One issue is the longer lasting impact of carbon pollution versus methane gas pollution.

"Lab meat doesn't solve anything from an environmental perspective, since the energy emissions are so high," said Marco Springmann, a senior environmental researcher at the University of Oxford.

Some lab-grown meat contains an animal by-product known as fetal bovine serum (FBS). Slaughterhouses obtain fetal bovine serum by collecting blood from the unborn calves of pregnant cows after they’re killed. San Francisco-based lab-grown meat producer Eat Just uses a “very low level” of the serum in its chicken, which is the first lab-grown meat product to hit the market.

However, companies are quickly pivoting to find alternatives to FBS. In response to ethical concerns about using a slaughter house by product in the otherwise lab-grown meat, Dutch startup Mosa Meat revealed this year that it had successfully eliminated FBS from its process. Eat Just is also developing an animal-free alternative to fetal bovine serum.

Scientists are working for try to make lab grown meat more healthy which full fill nutritions requirements with in  low cast.

History

The theoretical possibility of growing meat in an industrial setting has long been of interest. In a 1931 essay published by various periodicals and later included in his work Thoughts and Adventures, British statesman Winston Churchill wrote: "We shall escape the absurdity of growing a whole chicken to eat the breast or wing, by growing these parts separately under a suitable medium."

Initial research 

In the 1950s, Dutch researcher Willem van Eelen independently came up with the idea for cultured meat. As a prisoner of war during the Second World War, Van Eelen suffered from starvation, leaving him passionate about food production and food security. He attended a university lecture discussing the prospects of preserved meat. The earlier discovery of cell lines provided the basis for the idea.

Vitro cultivation of first muscle fibers 

In vitro cultivation of muscle fibers was first performed successfully in 1971 when pathologist Russel Ross cultured guinea-pig aorta.

Tissue engineering 

In 1991, Jon F. Vein secured patent US 6835390 for the production of tissue-engineered meat for human consumption, wherein muscle and fat would be grown in an integrated fashion to create food products.

Cultured meat production 

In 2001, dermatologist Wiete Westerhof along with van Eelen and businessperson Willem van Kooten announced that they had filed for a worldwide patent on a process to produce cultured meat.[43] The process employed a matrix of collagen seeded with muscle cells bathed in a nutritious solution and induced to divide.

That same year, NASA began conducting cultured meat experiments, with the intent of allowing astronauts to grow meat instead of transporting it. In partnership with Morris Benjaminson, they cultivated goldfish and turkey.

In 2003, Oron Catts and Ionat Zurr exhibited a few centimeters of "steak", grown from frog stem cells, which they cooked and ate. The goal was to start a conversation surrounding the ethics of cultured meat—"was it ever alive?", "was it ever killed?", "is it in any way disrespectful to an animal to throw it away?"

In the early 2000s, American public health student Jason Matheny traveled to India and visited a factory chicken farm. He was appalled by the implications of this system. Matheny later teamed up with three scientists involved in NASA's efforts. In 2004, Matheny founded New Harvest to encourage development by funding research. In 2005 the four published the first peer-reviewed literature on the subject.

In 2008, PETA offered a $1 million prize to the first company to bring cultured chicken meat to consumers by 2012. The contestant was required to complete two tasks to earn the prize:

- produce a cultured chicken meat product that was indistinguishable from real chicken and

- produce the product in large enough quantities to be competitively sold in at least 10 states.

The contest was later extended until 4 March 2014. The deadline eventually expired without a winner.

In 2008, the Dutch government invested $4 million into experiments regarding cultured meat. The In Vitro Meat Consortium, a group formed by international researchers, held the first international conference hosted by the Food Research Institute of Norway in April. Time magazine declared cultured meat production to be one of the 50 break through ideas of 2009. In November 2009, scientists from the Netherlands announced they had managed to grow meat using cells from a live pig.

First public trial

The first cultured beef burger patty was created by Mark Post at Maastricht University in 2013. It was made from over 20,000 thin strands of muscle tissue, cost over $300,000 and needed 2 years to produce.

Industrial development

Between 2011 and 2017, many cultured meat startups were launched. Memphis Meats (now Upside Foods[58]) launched a video in February 2016, showcasing its cultured beef meatball. In March 2017, it showcased chicken tenders and duck a l'orange, the first cultured poultry shown to the public.

An Israeli company, SuperMeat, ran a crowdfunding campaign in 2016, for its work on cultured chicken.

Finless Foods, a San Francisco-based company working on cultured fish, was founded in June 2016. In March 2017 it commenced laboratory operations.

In March 2018, Eat Just (in 2011 founded as Hampton Creek in San Francisco, later known as Just, Inc.) claimed to be able to offer a consumer product from cultured meat by the end of 2018. According to CEO Josh Tetrick the technology was already there. JUST had about 130 employees and a research department of 55 scientists, where cultured meat from poultry, pork and beef was researched. JUST has received investments from Chinese billionaire Li Ka-shing, Yahoo! co-founder Jerry Yang and according to Tetrick also by Heineken International and others.

On 27 April 2022, the European Commission approved the request for the collection of signatures for the European Citizens' Initiative End The Slaughter Age to shift subsidies from animal husbandry to cellular agriculture.

Market entry

European Union 

In the European Union, novel foods such as cultured meat products have to go through a testing period of about 18 months during which a company must prove to the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) that their product is safe. In March 2022, cultured meat producers had reached the level of attempting to gain regulatory approval from European Union supranational institutions coming just before mass goods could be sold to consumers. By February 2023, none had yet submitted a novel food dossier for approval by the EFSA. Legal experts explained this as having to do with the fact that, although the EFSA's novel food procedure has been well-established since 1997 (unlike in other jurisdictions, that still have or had to develop certain regulatory standards), it is a long and complicated process in which companies can have little imput once they have submitted their request, unlike cultured meat startups in the United States (who could easily communicate back and forth with the FDA to clarify any issues), and in the UK, Singapore and Israel (where governments have implemented a 'single point of contact' responsible for the overall process).

Israel

In November 2020, SuperMeat opened a 'test restaurant' in Ness Ziona, Israel, right next to its pilot plant; journalists, experts and a small number of consumers could book an appointment to taste the novel food there, while looking through a glass window into the production facility on the other side. The restaurant was not yet fully open to the public, because as of June 2021 SuperMeat still needed to wait for regulatory approval to start mass production for public consumption, and because the COVID-19 pandemic restricted restaurant operations. By February 2023, Israeli authorities had established a regulatory structure similar to that of Singapore, and shown a general willingness to work towards approval (as well as financing research for cultivated food innovation), but were still in the process of developing safety regulations in consultations with researchers and other experts. For example, the Israeli Health Ministry and UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) co-organised a convention of cultivated food safety regulation experts in September 2022.

Singapore

On 2 December 2020, the Singapore Food Agency approved the "chicken bites" produced by Eat Just for commercial sale. It marked the first time that a cultured meat product passed the safety review (which took 2 years) of a food regulator, and was widely regarded as a milestone for the industry. The chicken bits were scheduled for introduction in Singaporean restaurants. Restaurant "1880" became the first to serve cultured meat to customers on Saturday 19 December 2020. In January 2023, the SFA also granted regulatory approval for the production of cultured meat with serum-free media to Eat Just' subsidiary GOOD Meat, which had introduced its clean chicken product in several more Singaporese restaurants as well as hawker centres and food delivery services since 2020, and was constructing the bioreactors for its new facility in Singapore. This world-first approval was said to be a milestone in making cultivated meat production more scalable and efficient.

United States

In May 2022, Finless Foods launched pokè-style plant-based tuna product at National Restaurant Association's Show, with availability at restaurants and foodservice operators across the United States. In November 2022, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) completed the pre-market consultation of Upside Foods (formerly Memphis Meats), concluding that its products were safe to eat, a first for cultivated meat companies in the United States.[99] Only the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) still had to finalise the labelling and inspection process; as of April 2023, this last hurdle to U.S. market entry was expected to be overcome somewhere in 2023.

Continue

Medical Science

 

Medical science covers many subjects which try to explain how the human body works. Starting with basic biology it is generally divided into areas of specialisation, such as anatomy, physiology and pathology with some biochemistry, microbiology, molecular biology and genetics. Students and practitioners of holistic models of health also recognise the importance of the mind-body connection and the importance of nutrition.

Knowledge of how the body functions is a fundamental requirement for continued studies in the medical profession or for training as a health practitioner. To be able to diagnose disease a practitioner first needs to understand how a fit and healthy body functions. It is difficult to truly evaluate and diagnose disease without the knowledge of the effects of diseases and how the normal function of the body can be restored. 

The human body is a complex organism and our approach to the study of human physiology is an integrative one. We take the holistic approach in seeing how things can go wrong in the body and how it can be brought back into balance. The term holistic comes from the word ‘whole’. Diseases can affect people not only physically but also emotionally and our approach recognises the different systems and functions of the body as interdependent and whole.

Anatomy

Anatomy (deals with internal structure of organisms) is the study of the component parts of the human body - for example, the heart, the brain, the kidney or muscles, bones and skin. Medical students are required to carry out a practical dissection of a body in order to understand how it all connects up and many colleges of medicine use real bodies where others use computer simulation. Most holistic courses only study the theory of anatomy but some courses may admit outside students to the dissection room.

Physiology

Physiology (deals with normal function of organisms) is the application of the study of anatomy into the realm of how the body parts normally function independently and as a component of a system, such as the heart and the circulatory system with blood vessels and blood. In order to make people better it is essential to know how the body systems work in health so that you can tell what is wrong when patients feel ill and be able to track their recovery. It is also vital to understand that organ systems are interconnected too and how they work together.

Pathology

Pathology (deals with science of causes and effects of diesease) is the study of disease states. Medical students are required to diagnose diseases as separate entities and have an enormous vocabulary to describe disease states. (If you have learned Greek or Latin it is easy to understand the terminology as it is descriptive in these languages but if you haven’t it is quite daunting!) Holistic therapists are usually less interested in a standard diagnosis for a patient and much more concerned with the symptoms produced by the individual. But both medical systems require an intelligent understanding of prognosis (i.e. what is the likely outcome for the patient with their disease following treatment?).

Continue

The Muslim Scientists and their Contributions in Science

The knowledge that provides understanding of this world and how it works, is science.

Systematic knowledge of the physical or material world gained through observation and experimentation is called science.

One of the most important contributions Muslims have made to society is in scientific discovery. In fact, many modern scientists are inspired by the work done by Muslim scientists from centuries ago.

Muslim Period 600-1600 AD

The science grew and flourished in early civilizations of the world.  The

 The Egyptians, the Greeks, the Romans and the Muslims contbuted much to the science.  The Musliis made a rich contribution to the knowledge in science.

They spread like shining stars on the horizon of the world of science

They made effective and invaluable services in the field of science.  This period of Muslims is almost 1000 years long (600-1600 AD).

Muslims laid the foundation of the laboratory methods.  These methods are still used in modern science.

The Muslim scientists discovered many elements e.g.  Arsenic (As), Antimony (Sb)  and Bisrmuuth (Bi) etc.

They developed and used many laboratory instruments eg funnels, crucible etc.  Many new chemical processes were also introduced by

Muslim scientists e.g.  filtration, fermentation, distillation etc.  Thus, this period provides basis for the modern chemistry.  The period of Muslims is called the period of AI-Chemists" in the history of chemistry. Muslims scientist presented science as purely "experimental or practical science".  Some well known Muslim scientists and their achievements are mentioned here.

Jabir Ibn Hayyan (721-815)

A Pioneering Islamic Alchemisth

Jabir Ibn Hayyan is generally known as the father of chemistry.  He was probably the first scientist who had a well established laboratory.  He invented experimental methods such as distillation, sublimation, filtration, extraction of metals etc.  He prepared Hydrochloric acid, Nitric acid and white lead.

Jabir Ibn Hayyan was an influential Muslim scientist believed to be the author of the Jabirian Corpus.  This text focuses on religious philosophy, alchemy, and magic.

Jabir is also credited with being one of the first people to systematically classify chemical substances.  This was an important step in the development of modern chemistry and medicine.

Muhammad Ibn Masa al-Khwarizmi (780-850)

Father of Algebra

Muhammad ibn Musa Al-Khwarizmi was a Muslim scientist best known for coming up with the completing square method of solving quadratic equations.

In his home country of Iraq, Khwarizmi was a prominent mathematician who wrote about algebraic equations and how to solve them.  He also wrote on trigonometry, geography, astronomy, and other subjects.

Khwarizmi is considered one of the fathers of algebra due to his work on the methods of solving quadratic and linear equations.  He was also the first person to view algebra as an independent discipline. 

Khwarizmi's work by him helped introduce the decimal number system to Europe when translated into Latin.

Yaqub Kindi (800-873)

Pioneer of reflection of light 

He was born in Basra, Iraq. He produced extensive research monographs work was done in the field, especially on reflection of light.

Thabat Ibn Qurra (836-901)

A Reformer of Ptolemaic Astronomy

Thabit ibn Qurra was a Turkish mathematician and astronomer notable for reforming the Ptolemaic system.  He also contributed to mechanics, algebra, and geometry.

His work on astronomy, particularly regarding the Ptolemaic system, paved the way for a new model to describe the solar system.

 Claudius Ptolemy developed the Ptolemaic system.  It proposed geocentrism to explain the motion of celestial bodies around Earth using mathematical models.

Thabit ibn Qurra discovered that a sidereal year has 365 days, 6 hours, 9 minutes, and 12 seconds.  This discovery led Nicolaus Copernicus to discover that the Earth rotates around the Sun instead of vice versa (called heliocentrism).

Al-Battani (858-929)

Ptolemy of the Arab World

Al-Battani was a mathematician and astronomer born in modern-day Turkey.  He's best known for being the first person to discover how the solar eclipse occurs.  Al-Battani figured out that it's caused by the moon being between us and the sun.

He also introduced sines and several trigonometric relationships that mathematicians use today.

Mohammed ibn Zakariya Al-Razi (865-935)

A Pioneer in Medicine

Al-Razi was a Persian physician chemist and philospher. He wrote 26 books but the most famous book was Al-Asrar. In this book, he discussed the different processes of chemistry. He was the first chemist to divide the chemical compounds into four types and also divide the substance into living and non-living origin. He prepared alcohol by fermentation.

He is most notable for pioneering medical science.

He is also credited with being the first person to distinguish between smallpox and measles.  Even though he achieved this feat, Al-Razi didn't have much luck convincing anyone that he was right about it—people just thought he had gone crazy.

He's also known for writing the first pediatrics book, and he taught students how to treat patients.

Al-Razi was one of the earliest experimentalists in medicine.  He believed that symptoms were not caused by magic or spirits.

His most important contribution from him was his dedication to empirical evidence instead of superstition or relying on prior knowledge.  He believed that everything should be tested before being accepted as fact.

Abu Nasr Al-Farabi (872-951)

One of The Greatest Ancient Islamic Philosophers

Abu Nasr Al-Farabi was a Muslim philosopher, mathematician, and cosmologist.  He is best known for his works in logic, metaphysics, political philosophy, and ethics.

Al-Farabi was born in present-day Afghanistan when the Islamic empire was expanding rapidly across Asia.  As a result, he was exposed to different cultures from an early age.

This Muslim scientist is considered one of the greatest thinkers of the Islamic Golden Age.  He was also a pioneer in sociology, psychology, and political philosophy.

Abu Hanifa ad-Dinawari (895-902)
Father of Arabic Botany

Abu Hanifa ad-Dinawari was a Persian polymath and the author of the Book of Plants.  He is notable for his contributions to mathematics, astronomy, and botany.

Dinawari pioneered Arabic botany by creating an index that documented all the different types of plants.

His plant book by him was one of the most important works on botany in the medieval Islamic world.  It consists of six volumes and more than 600 pages.

This treatise contains information about plants—their names, and characteristics.

Ad-Dinawari was also one of the first Muslim scientists to examine the relationship between astronomical concepts and plants.

Abul-Qasm Ammar Ibn Ali al-Mosli (900-1000)

The inventor of the hypodermic syringe

Ammar ibn Ali Al-Mawsili was an Arab ophthalmologist known for inventing the hypodermic syringe.

He used this hollow needle to remove cataracts from patients' eyes.  This allowed him to perform surgery on their eyes without damaging any of their other organs.

Inventing the hypodermic syringe was not just one of his many accomplishments—it was a milestone in the history of medicine.

Kitab al-Muntakhab fi ilm al-Ayn wa Mudawatiha bi'l Adwiya wal Hadid (Book of Choices in the Treatment of Eye Disease and Its Medicines and Medical Instruments), deals with anatomy, pathology and describes six case histories for cataract surgery and a  case of optic neuritis.

Al-Hasan Ibn Al-Haytham (965-1039)

Father of Modern Optics

Hee was Born in Basra , Iraq during the Islamic Golden Age, Ibn Al-Haitham is best known for paving the way for modern scientists. 

He produced extensive research monographs on metrology, specific gravity and tides.

His Book of Optics named Kitab ul Manazir was one of the most important works on optics ever written. It offered a new understanding of light and vision.

He also considered as the inventor of pin-hope camera.

Al-Hasan is also known for pioneering the scientific method. This process involves careful observation and experimentation to test hypotheses about how things work.

Today, scientists use the scientific method to study a wide range of topics. It has helped us to understand everything from the solar system to human behavior.

In the field of Chemistry, he understood the different chemical procedures and chemical  combinations.

He determined the densities of different substances.

Al Beruni (973-1048)

Shape of earth shape and phases of sun and moon 

He is Afghan scholar and wrote about 150 books on Physics, cosmology, geology, culture, archeology, and medicine.

Al Beruni discussed the shape of earth the movement of sun, moon and phases of moon.

Ibn Sina (980-1037)

Father of Medicine

Ibn- sina is generally known as the Aristotle of the Muslim's world.

Abu Ali Ibn Sina, or Avicenna as he was known in the West, was a prominent Muslim scientist.  He was a physician and philosopher who wrote on several topics, from alchemy to medicine.

He is famous for his contributions in the fields of Medicine, Mathematics, Astronomy, Medicinal chemistry and philosophy.

He is the first scientist who rejected the idea, that base metals can be converted into Gold.

He wrote more than hundred books. These books taught in Europe for centuries. 

His notable books by him include The Book of Healing and The Canon of Medicine.  Medieval universities used his books of him as standard medical texts until the Renaissance.  Avicenna's work by him was so influential that he became known as "the most famous physician of the Islamic Golden Age" by historians.

Ali Ibn As al-Kahhal (1010-1038)
was a pioneer in Waftalmullah

Ali ibn Isa al-Kahhal was an ophthalmologist who made his mark in medieval science.  His book Memorandum of the Occultists was one of the most influential texts during this time.  It covered many eye diseases and their treatments.

In addition to providing information about specific eye disorders, Isa al-Kahhal also illustrated the anatomy of the eye itself.

This talented scholar is often credited with helping bring ophthalmology into its modern form.  His work on this subject predates that of many European scientists by hundreds of years.  It shows just how advanced Islamic science was during this period.

Ismail al-Jazari (1136-1206)

Father of Robotics & Inventor

Al-Jazari was a scholar and polymath who lived in the 12th century.  He is noted for his work in many fields of science, including robotics and mechanical engineering.

In addition to being an astronomer, he was also an inventor who developed the first elephant clock and other devices that were used during the Arab civilization.

Al-Jazari's work in engineering began with a handbook for building devices.  This text is known as “The Book of Knowledge of Ingenious Mechanical Devices.”  It contains detailed descriptions of 50 mechanical devices used during his time and instructions on how to build them.

Besides these significant contributions to engineering, Al-Jazari developed several other types of innovative devices.  This work set the stage for the first robot.

Ibn al-Baytar (1197-1248 AD)

The Man Who Recorded Medieval Medicine

Ibn al-Baytar was an influential Arab physician and botanist from the Middle Ages.  Not only was he an expert in Arabic medicine, but he also had a great knowledge of plants and their medicinal properties.

In his time, Ibn al-Baytar was one of the most well-known Muslim scholars.  He wrote many books on the subjects that interested him, including medicine and botany.

Ibn al-Baytar's work is used today by modern researchers studying medieval medicine and science.

Ibn al-Nafis (1213-1288)

Father of Pulmonary Circulation of Blood

Ibn al-Nafis was an Arab polymath and physician who lived in the 13th century.  He is notable for contributing to medical science and Islamic philosophy.  Many modern medical practitioners continue to cite his work to this date.

Al-Nafis produced the world's first description of pulmonary blood circulation.  He discovered that pulmonary blood circulation begins at the heart's right ventricle and continues through capillaries in the lungs before returning to the left atrium via pulmonary veins.

Al-Nafis also described how blood passes through capillaries between arteries and veins (known as capillary circulation).

Ibn Khaldun (1332-1406)

Social scientist 

One of The Greatest Social Scientists of Medieval Islam

Ibn Khaldun was an expert in Islamic social sciences.  He is notable for popularizing the Islamic perspective on sociology, historiography, demography, and economics.

As an Islamic scholar, Ibn Khaldun helped Ottoman historians analyze the Ottoman Empire.

He also wrote on various topics of history, such as politics and economics.  His book of his titled Introduction provided valuable information on how to study history and how it is related to other disciplines such as sociology and economics.

Piri Reis (1465-1553)

Navigator & Cartographer

Piri Reis was a Turkish navigator and cartographer who lived in the 16th century.  He's notable for making one of the oldest maps known today, which detailed the coastlines of Africa and Europe.

His text Book of Navigation described navigational techniques and ports along the Mediterranean Sea.

Piri Reis had access to some of the most advanced scientific knowledge of his time about him.  I have used it to create maps that are still resourceful.

Famous Pakistani scientists of current era 

Mohammad Abdus Salam (1926-1996)

Presenter of Electroweak unificationt theory

(29 January 1926- 21 November 1996), was a Pakistani theoretical physicist.  A major figure in 20th century theoretical physics, he shared the 1979 Nobel Prize in Physics with Sheldon Glashow and Steven Weinberg for his contribution to the electroweak unification theory.

He was the first Pakistani to receive a Nobel Prize in science.

Abdul Qadeer Khan (April 1936-10 October 2021)

Father of Pakistani Atomic bomb 

Dr. Abdul Qadeer Khan known as A. Q. Khan (born in 27 April 1936 bhopal India) is a Pakistani nuclear physicist and a metallurgical engineer, who founded the uranium enrichment program for Pakistan's atomic bomb project.  He founded and

Established Kahuta Research Laboratories (KRL) in 1976, and served as both its Senior Scientista nd Director-General until he retired in 2001.

Pakistan become 1st Muslim and 7th nuclear power in the world because of dr khan in 28 may 1998 with testing of seven nuclear blast in Balochistan chagi.

Continue