General > Biology

The sex is decieded by 1 singel gene

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Numsgil:
Found this (if you really want the site, okay... but I'd like to keep the forum more or less G rated...)


--- Quote ---...glands were made in the womb before physical gender was determined (in the womb a baby goes through a stage where it is neither male or female, at this point has nipples gonads, which will develop into ovaries or testicles, and a small bump that will be either a clitoris or a penis). 
--- End quote ---
.

So if you find a gene that makes this nub develop into a penis, you may still have female genitalia.  You're not a guy (but I guess you're not really a girl either.)

Point is, there's no '1 singel gene' that determines sex, because there's no '1 singel' thing that makes you male or female.  It's a collection of physical and psychological (I mean brain chemistry) differences.

shvarz:
Yeah, I just talked to my wife.  She works on the mouse genetics, says she never heard of a single "sex" gene.  It is really pretty close to how Nums put it: "sex" is hard to define and there is a lot of regulation going on.

Zelos:
I think that if ur not born whit a reproduction organ, but have so it only look little like it, you are neither one of the sexes

shvarz:
zelos, the point Nums was trying to make is that reproductive organs don't make "sex".  You can have perfect reproductive organs, yet be unable to bear children, because your hormonal system is messed up.  Alternatively, you may look like a perfect (fe)male, but have no normal reproductive organs.  Finally, you can be a perfect (fe)male, but may die soon after birth.  All of these are examples of different deffects that are caused by mutations in sex-related genes.

The thing is that "sex" is a very-very complex thing and it cannot be regulated by one gene.  What most liekely happened was that the scientists found some gene that regulated one particular aspect of "sex" and the journalist did not think it was "hot enough", so (s)he changed it to "sex is decided by one gene".  This happens every day, even with very serious newspapers and journals.  I pretty much try to not read those sections at all, because all it does for me is it pisses me off :)

Ulciscor:
I have read about cases of normal XY males becoming females because of the IQC (I think) of the X and Y chromosomes... the X chromosome having the DAX gene to make a human female and the Y chromosome having SRY to make them male. However, the X chromosome can obtain an extra DAX which makes them physically female when genetically male. I think I have all those crazy anagrams the right way round lol.

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