McCarthy and Nugent succeeded in changing the brain of a
female rat—after the window had closed—which resulted in the female rat brain
taking on the characteristics of a male rat brain. The injections occurred after the first week of birth
when the window for brain sexual differentiation was thought to have been
closed. Despite this, the preoptic area in these animals was transformed, and
took on structural characteristics of a male rat. The female rats also behaved
differently, displaying sexual behavior typical of male rats. In another
experiment, McCarthy and Nugent genetically deleted the Dnmt gene in female mice. These
animals also showed male behavior patterns. Nugent said, “Physically, these
animals were females, but in their reproductive behavior, they were males. It
was fascinating to see this transformation."
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