Synthetic protein offers new hope for male infertility

A research team from Queen's University in Canada, led by Richard Oko, has indentified a method of inducing fertilization using a synthetic version of the protein PAWP found in sperm cells. Their findings could circumvent the problem for men whose sperm is unable to initiate the fertilization process. "PAWP is able to induce embryo development in human eggs in a fashion similar to the natural triggering of embryo development by the sperm cell during fertilization," says Dr. Oko of the Biomedical and Molecular Sciences department.