Mindblown: a blog about philosophy.

From the Greek word xenos, meaning “stranger.” Xenotransplant is the implantation of an organ or limb from one species to another organism in a different species. When performed in animals, “rejection” of the transplant by the recipient’s immune system is a common response.  

The (theoretical) production of offspring that are genetically different from, and genotypically unrelated to either of the parents of that offspring. The process of producing offspring that differ from the parents.  

From the Greek word xenos, meaning “stranger.” Xenogeneic literally means “strange genes.” Refers to genetically engineered (e.g., “humanized”) organs that have been grown within an animal of another species. For example, several companies are working to engineer and grow—inside swine—a number of organs to be transplanted into humans that need those organs (e.g., due to…

Those compounds (e.g., veterinary drugs, agrochemical herbicides, etc.) that are designed to be used in an ecosystem comprised of more than one species. For example, herbicides intended to kill weeds but leave commercial crops undamaged or veterinary drugs that are intended to kill parasitic worms but leave the host livestock unharmed.  

The use of diffraction patterns produced by X-ray scattering from crystals (of a given material’s molecules) to determine the three-dimensional structure of the molecules.  

A sex chromosome that usually occurs paired in each female cell, and single (i.e., unpaired) in each male cell in those species in which the male typically has two unlike sex chromosomes (e.g., humans). A sex-determining chromosome present in all of a female’s ova and in one-half of a male’s sperm. The fertilization of an…