WASHINGTON: Half of the 24 new lizard species known as skinks, all discovered on the Caribbean islands, may be close to extinction and the other half are also under threat. Researchers led by Blair Hedges, professor of biology at Penn State University, attributed their loss to the mongoose, a predatory mammal introduced by farmers to control rats in sugarcane fields during the late 19th century.

Researchers have discovered a new family of legless amphibians, commonly known as caecilians. After DNA analysis of the specimen, scientists have confirmed that it is an entirely new family. These findings have been published in a paper, Discovery of a new family of amphibians from Northeast India with ancient links to Africa, in the current issue of Proceedings of Royal Society of London.

Using The ‘Dolly Method’ To Make Customized Human Stems Cells Can Help Fight Major Diseases
London: For the first time, scientists have created human embryos from slivers of skin, a feat they say has brought closer the day when babies are cloned in the lab.
In experiments that mirror the cloning technique used to make ‘Dolly the sheep’, the researchers took cells from men’s arms and legs and placed them into women’s eggs.

Regenerative medicine crossed another milestone this week when scientists at the University of Lund in Sweden demonstrated the direct conversion of skin tissue cells into nerve cells. So far, the standard technique in this field has been to convert adult cells (usually from the skin) into stem cells, and then converting stem cells into tissues or organs that have to be transplanted. This method has several risks and has not worked well in humans so far, although a few recent breakthroughs seem promising.

Scientists claim to have for the first time created viable artificial sperm using stem cells, a major breakthrough which they say could lead to new treatments for infertile men. A team at Kyoto University in Japan has created the sperm-producing germ cells in a laboratory and transferred them into infertile mice, which after the treatment were able to produce healthy offspring, The Daily Telegraph reported.