Mice are good for growing human ears and guiding your way to the bathroom at night. But what are gay mice good for? Science is about to tell us, as researchers have found that regulating the serotonin levels — or rather, the receptivity to serotonin — controls a mouse’s sexual orientation (or sexual preference, if you’re reading this BBC article). Ooooh, I’ve always wanted a gay pet!
In a new study published in the journal Nature, British scientists reveal:
The research team first bred male mice whose brains were not receptive to serotonin. A series of experiments demonstrated that these mice had lost the preference for females shown by unmodified males. When presented with a choice of partners, they showed no overall preference for either males or females. When just a male was introduced into the cage, the modified males were far more likely to mount the male and emit a “mating call” normally given off when encountering females than unmodified males were. Similar results were achieved when a different set of mice were bred. These lacked the tryptonphan hydroxylase 2 gene, which is needed to produce serotonin.
However, a preference for females could be “restored” by injecting serotonin into the brain. The report concludes: “Serotonergic signalling is crucial for male sexual preference in mice. This is the first time, to our knowledge, that a neurotransmitter in the brain has been demonstrated to be important in mammalian sexual preference.”
As we all know this technology will be used either to ensure parents give birth to gay children (because who wouldn’t want to raise a perfect human specimen?) or, you know, more likely, ensure parents absolutely do not. The good news is that a quick needle to the brain might one day be able to flip your switch should you ever need to get it up for the opposite sex. Straight-for-pay porn, anyone?
Spencer
:/ I sense a future drop in the gay population….hopefully this is a long way off.
RJP
The mice here are the questioned pure bisexual not homosexual they have no preference per the article at all between opposite or same sex so gay mice is a misnomer here. @Spencer, the article at the BBC states scientists doubt this would apply to humans as serotonin control drugs are already being used for mental health purposes and there has been no reported change in sexual orientation.
Ken
Well, so much for it being a “lifestyle choice”. To think Lady Gaga may have been right after all.
And if being gay is in fact demonstrably biologically rooted in humans, think how this will set the cat among the conservative pigeons. Up until now most conservative Christians have been leery of both in utero surgical modification or any form of in utero “tampering” (even if it is to save a baby’s life or “fix” a birth defect) or even more strongly, come out against any form genetic modification or selection in unborn human beings.
Seems like this research might lead to 1) a technique to “cure the gay away” before a bay is born in utero, 2) screening of the unborn for “gay” tendencies (in effect, opening the door to selective abortion to save the hapless unborn from being “doomed to a life of carnal sin”), or 3) post natal brain surgery to “fix” heterosexuality into individuals.
Will the Vatican have a revelation saying that in future gay babies must be saved through abortion? Will the GOP and the Tea Party have to reverse course on Obamacare and ask that the federal government pay to ensure such medical procedures are covered in order to “save our nation from the heinous sin of homosexuality”? Will Catholic and evangelical churches hold fund raisers to ensure no gays are ever born again?
Oh yes, it should be almost fun to watch just how far the right wing will move against their other “conservative principles” in order to once and for all get rid of those “damn gays”.
And we thought those extreme right wingers were a nightmare now. Yikes!
Spencer
@RJP: Yay! ^.^ got me worried for a sec
greenmanTN
If you read the actual article: Humans NOT included!
They’ve been fucking around with human serotonin levels for decades with anti-depressants and it doesn’t effect human sexual orientation. Period.
However, look at other articles linked to this one and they’re about subtle but observable physical differences between gays and straights. You know all those vaguely silly articles about gay people and counter-clockwise hair swirls, comparatively longer or shorter middle fingers, and brain structures? Well, it’s all about the inherent, inborn nature of homosexuality and how study after study confirms it. So suck it, Bible beaters!
GaboRJ
Yeah, I cure for my horrible disease! *sarcasm*