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CONTROL OVER LIFE. "The nature of the control over life in artificial parthenogenesis was different from that exhibited by Loeb's earlier work on heteromorphosis. In one sense it was less dramatic, since it led to no visibly new forms, but only to that familiar embryological object, the sea urchin pluteus. But that was no disadvantage. Heteromorphosis could be downgraded as merely the creation of monsters, an imitation of nature's mistakes with no real biological significance." https://lnkd.in/eQf5Evv View in LinkedIn

SALT BATH, VIRGIN BIRTH. "Loeb found that by treating sea urchin eggs with appropriate inorganic salt solutions he could initiate embryological development, a process which up to that time had required the sperm of the male urchin. Physical chemistry could be a tool for altering the basic process of reproduction." (1899). https://lnkd.in/eQf5Evv View in LinkedIn

FIRST SYNTHETIC BIOLOGY. "It is in the end still possible that I find my dream realized, to see a constructive or engineering biology in place of a biology that is merely analytical." Artificial parthenogenesis brought Loeb scientific fame, and even popular notoriety, as a modern Faust. He used that heroic stature to continue his quest in what he considered the true Eden of California. Loeb worked alone on the shores of the Pacific for seven years, returning east periodically to proclaim the new scientific era." https://lnkd.in/eQf5Evv View in LinkedIn

MANUFACTURE OF LIFE. "He considered artificial parthenogenesis, in some ways "the most vital discovery in the history of physiology," a near approach to "the manufacture of life in the laboratory." https://lnkd.in/eQf5Evv View in LinkedIn

CREATING THE BEGINNINGS OF LIFE. "Loeb showed scientists how to induce artificial parthenogenesis, thus refuting the idea that spermatozoa alone were necessary to develop eggs into embryos and confirming the idea that the chemical constitution of embryos’ environment affected their development. Furthermore, Loeb’s work showed that scientists could manipulate materials in a laboratory to create, as he called the process, the beginning stages of life." https://embryo.asu.edu/pages/jacques-loeb-1859-1924 View in LinkedIn

WE ARE NOT AMUSED. "Loeb was not glad to read that he had demonstrated the possibility of the "immaculate conception" of Jesus, nor that artificial parthenogenesis was equivalent to spontaneous generation." https://lnkd.in/eQf5Evv View in LinkedIn

BIRTH OF EMBRYOLOGY. "Jacques Loeb (1859-1924) experimented on embryos in Europe and the United States at the end of the nineteenth and beginning of the twentieth centuries. Among the first to study embryos through experimentation, Loeb helped found the new field of experimental embryology." https://lnkd.in/e74zn8H View in LinkedIn

IMMACULATUM. "One religious paper noted that "it is interesting to know that the science of this recent day is entertaining as a possibility what Christian faith accepts as actual in the case of the most notable birth that ever occurred." https://lnkd.in/eQf5Evv View in LinkedIn

FRAGMENT FROM NATURE focuses on the first demonstration of artificial parthenogenesis and the firestorm it created. Pathenogenesis is a type of natural asexual reproduction in which the offspring develops from unfertilized eggs, effectively an immaculate conception. This is a story of an eccentric scientist who was launched into the public limelight by his provocative work. View in LinkedIn

DANGERS OF SALT WATER. "They talked about "maiden ladies" giving up sea bathing on hearing of Loeb's discovery, and joked that vacations at the seashore did often result in conception." https://lnkd.in/eQf5Evv View in LinkedIn