I do not want a child now!

After long analyzes and studies, oocyte cryopreservation, commonly known as "Egg frezzing" is no longer an experimental procedure, and now it has been used in high scale in "mainstream" clinics.

It may sound perfect since more couples are deciding to delay pregnancy and for women with fertility or cancer treatments. But data is rather incomplete: it suggests that reproduction might not be successful as former studies showed. It is a fragile procedure that can affect the cells and provoke long-term effects such as increasing the risk of rare disorders as the Angelman Syndrome (a neurological condition). 

In 2008, when the American Society for Reproductive Medicine (ASRM) decided to label this technique as "experimental", only women going through fertility-damaging treatment for cancer or other type of treatments had the option to freeze their eggs to use them in the future and finally have a baby. However, it was used for other purposes too--which society didn't approve that much--such as for delaying having a baby (even if they didn't have fertility issues). But it wasn't until October 22, 2012, that mainstream clinics were allowed to offer this service (for a fee), encouraging more people to use this service. But not all clinics can offer these services since the ASRM policy is very strict. 

It may sound amazing that more than 900 children were born by using this procedure, but reproductive biologists keep on discussing the benefits and success of this technique in younger women, mainly because cells productivity may decrease with age. 

Who should use this technique?

In the case of women that don't want to have babies at the moment, is delaying reproduction by egg freezing just a fancy (and expensive) technique that crosses the line of natural reproduction?     

Would you like to hear the experts' opinion? Also, a woman explains why she decided to freeze her eggs. 

Stop feeling lonely, now facebook can hug you!

As you just read it, besides sharing photos and chatting with your friends now you can receive hugs from them as well. This will be possible thanks to a wearable social media vest called "Like-A-Hug" designed by Massachussets Institute of Technology scientists whose aim is to mimick the sensation of a warm hug by inflating everytime you Facebook friends "Like" any of your post.

here there is a picture of the vest, as you can see it looks like a tight-fitting black bodywarmer

In the designer Melisa Chow's website says that with this you can  “feel the warmth, encouragement, support or love that we feel when we receive hugs,” and you can even return the hugs by deflating the vest by wraping your arms around the shoulders, in others words, by hugging yourself.
The designers declared that they had the idea of the concept after a casual conversation about long distance relationships and the limitations of video chat when they came up with the idea of this vest.

As the video demo describes this vest would make possible to express feelings and that's the reason why this invention has received different reactions. Some say that Like-A-Hug put a tangible feeling to your click and ask themselves how long it will take for this to become a best-seller while others think that this is a useless object because a real hug can't be replaced and this would only separate us even more.
This is may a good idea, but it is definitely not the same, not all hugs are the same, they are different  depending of the situation and the person who gives it to you.
Do you think that this will become popular and eventually we all will have our own vests? Would you use one?
Finally here is a video of Seinfeld explaining in a comic way how we sometimes prefer to communicate with technology rather than personally.

Mates for life

Spring is coming! Everything we can hear is "love, love, love". We can see couples in the streets, parks, and even in our campus. But are we the only ones who experiment this "special" feeling? What about the animals?

Some biologists found out that not only turtledoves stay together for a long time, as the twelve days of christmass tale told us. There are some extraordinary animals' lifestyles that have inspired our culture through time.

A clear example of this are swans. As we all have watched in movies, they are always the symbols of pure and eternal love. This is consequence of their monogamy. Swans stay with the same partner for almost all their lifetime. Even in some cases they even comite suicide when their lover dies.

Birds aren't the only one faithful specie. Wolves are always related to the concept of betray and coldness. Which it is not closed to what their family's lifestyle is about. They stay in groups called packs that consist in a male and female and their offspring. It's very similar to how families are made in our society but their relationship is even more stable than a lot of humans have.

Maybe love is not a concept well-known by the animal kind but they are able to have a faithful and long term relationship. Do you know some other examples? Would you call their bounds “love”?

(Source: http://www.divinecaroline.com/33/94736-eight-animals-mate)