More two-headed transgenic fluorescent zebrafish have been created by Taiwanese scientists, who are trying to determine the association between the occurrence of conjoined creatures and genes, according to the Academia Sinica.
A two-headed zebrafish was inadvertently created early last month by scientists at the Academia Sinica's Institute of Biological Chemistry who are studying muscular dystrophy. They used zebrafish as a model organism for the study of functional genomics.
They put a certain gene into 200 zebrafish embryos at the one-cell stage through a microinjection procedure. Basically, scientists said, the injected gene causes the death of muscle cells and affects the early development of embryos.
Unexpectedly, one of the 200 embryos developed 24 hours later into a fish with two-heads and two hearts.
A review of academic papers found no documentation of such a creature ever existing before. The journal Science, in its issue released on Feb. 20, reported on the fish.
The rare fish inspired the scientists to start studying the mechanisms causing conjoined creatures. Between the end of last month and early this month, they injected different genes into 750 embryos at the one-cell stage.
As of yesterday, eight more conjoined fish have been created
"These conjoined fish are all different. Some share tails and some share other parts," said Huang Chang-jen (黃銓珍), an associate research fellow at the institute.
Huang initially injected deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) of certain genes into the fish embryos. In his follow-up research, ribonucleic acid (RNA) of certain genes will be used.
"We hope to offer an alternative angle, the genetics, to approach the occurrence of conjoined creatures, including humans," Huang said.
Conjoined twins occur when one egg splits to become two identical eggs. What factors trigger the mechanism exactly, however, remain uncertain, Huang said.
According to Huang, there are three to four conjoined births per 100,000 in Taiwan, a much higher rate than in other countries. In some countries, Huang said, there is only one conjoined birth in more than 200,000.
Taipei on Thursday held urban resilience air raid drills, with residents in one of the exercises’ three “key verification zones” reporting little to no difference compared with previous years, despite government pledges of stricter enforcement. Formerly known as the Wanan exercise, the air raid drills, which concluded yesterday, are now part of the “Urban Resilience Exercise,” which also incorporates the Minan disaster prevention and rescue exercise. In Taipei, the designated key verification zones — where the government said more stringent measures would be enforced — were Songshan (松山), Zhongshan (中山) and Zhongzheng (中正) districts. Air raid sirens sounded at 1:30pm, signaling the
The number of people who reported a same-sex spouse on their income tax increased 1.5-fold from 2020 to 2023, while the overall proportion of taxpayers reporting a spouse decreased by 4.4 percent from 2014 to 2023, Ministry of Finance data showed yesterday. The number of people reporting a spouse on their income tax trended upward from 2014 to 2019, the Department of Statistics said. However, the number decreased in 2020 and 2021, likely due to a drop in marriages during the COVID-19 pandemic and the income of some households falling below the taxable threshold, it said. The number of spousal tax filings rebounded
A saleswoman, surnamed Chen (陳), earlier this month was handed an 18-month prison term for embezzling more than 2,000 pairs of shoes while working at a department store in Tainan. The Tainan District Court convicted Chen of embezzlement in a ruling on July 7, sentencing her to prison for illegally profiting NT$7.32 million (US$248,929) at the expense of her employer. Chen was also given the opportunity to reach a financial settlement, but she declined. Chen was responsible for the sales counter of Nike shoes at Tainan’s Shinkong Mitsukoshi Zhongshan branch, where she had been employed since October 2019. She had previously worked
Labor rights groups yesterday called on the Ministry of Labor to protect migrant workers in Taiwan’s fishing industry, days after CNN reported alleged far-ranging abuses in the sector, including deaths and forced work. The ministry must enforce domestic labor protection laws on Taiwan-owned deep-sea fishing vessels, the Coalition for Human Rights for Migrant Fishers told a news conference outside the ministry in Taipei after presenting a petition to officials. CNN on Sunday reported that Taiwanese seafood giant FCF Co, the owners of the US-based Bumble Bee Foods, committed human rights abuses against migrant fishers, citing Indonesian migrant fishers. The alleged abuses included denying
RSS