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Women might soon be able to produce sperm in a development that could allow lesbian couples to have their own biological daughters, according to a pioneering study published today. Scientists are seeking ethical permission to produce synthetic sperm cells from a woman's bone marrow tissue after showing that it possible to produce rudimentary sperm cells from male bone-marrow tissue. The researchers said they had already produced early sperm cells from bone-marrow tissue taken from men. They believe the findings show that it may be possible to restore fertility to men who cannot naturally produce their own sperm. But the results...

MONTPELIER — A bill that would prohibit discrimination against people based on their gender identity or expression won preliminary approval in the Senate on Thursday and the governor said he was likely to sign it if it reached him. That's despite Gov. Jim Douglas' veto of a similar bill last year because he believed it could cause some unintended consequences, such as a man trying to enter a woman's locker room for nefarious reasons and then defending himself by claiming he was identifying himself as a woman. Additional provisions were added to the bill to avoid those concerns and Douglas...

LITTLE ROCK - Legislation to ban gays and unmarried couples who live together from adopting children and serving as foster parents passed the Senate on Tuesday, along with a proposed renewal of a $575 million interstate highway bond program. -- SNIP -- Senate Bill 959 by Sen. Shawn Womack, R-Mountain Home, is a legislative response to a June 2006 state Supreme Court decision upholding a lower court ruling that struck down a state regulation that banned gays from serving as foster parents. Pulaski County Circuit Judge Timothy Fox ruled in December 2004 that the state Child Welfare Review Board overstepped...

The top U.S. military officer, Marine Gen. Peter Pace, doesn't plan to apologize for telling a newspaper that homosexuality is immoral. Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told the Chicago Tribune on Monday that he supports the "don't ask, don't tell" policy banning openly gay people from serving in the U.S. armed forces. The general also compared homosexuality to adultery -- behavior that is prosecuted in the military, he said. "My upbringing is such that I believe that there are certain things, certain types of conduct that are immoral," Pace told the Tribune. "I believe that military members...

NEW YORK (AP) -- Two women have sued a reproductive bank for $3 million, claiming the frozen storage facility lost their embryos. Cathy L. Berger and Adriana Pacheco of Hoboken, N.J., said in court papers they gave Repro Lab Inc. six embryos to store in September 2003. The pair said they had signed a contract to store the tissues there. The couple tried to collect the frozen embryos, created with eggs from Pacheco, in March 2006 after Berger began medical preparation for implantation, according to court papers. But the Manhattan-based Repro told the couple: "The aforesaid embryos were missing, could...