First test-tube human egg fertilizationIn 1944, American obstetrician and gynecologist Dr John Rock (1890-1984) with Miriam F. Menkin fertilized the first human egg in a test tube. After hundreds of efforts, they had produced the first laboratory- fertilized, two-cell human egg. The embryo was not returned to the womb, For some 15 years after 1938, Rock and Dr. Arthur Hertig sought to retrieve early fertilized human eggs from discarded hysterectomy tissue. Over that time they found thirty-four fertilized eggs, providing new knowledge about human conception. Aiding them in the search was Harvard physiologist Gregory Pincus. In 1938, Rock hired technician Miriam Menkin to try to extract and fertilize human eggs in his laboratory. Rock is best known as a developer of the birth control pill.* |
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