Friday, July 29, 1988AThe Battalion/Page 3
State and Local
Researchers study causes of low sperm count
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By Anita Arnold
Reporter
More couples are waiting until later in
life to have children only to discover that
the chances of conceiving those children
decrease as they grow older.
In many cases, a reduction in sperm
count among older men was considered the
problem. This prompted a study by Texas
A&M researchers to look at processes in the
testes that could be the cause of the de-
He said the goal of the study was to fig
ure out what changes occur in the testes
and in hormone levels to account for the
fact that older men produce fewer sperm
than younger men.
“One of the most important findings was
that the numbers of Sertoli cells, which are
the support cells in the testes, were reduced
at the same rate as sperm production rates
in a man as he grows older,” Dr. Larry
Johnson, associate professor of veterinary
anatomy, said. “Maybe our emphasis
should be placed on maintaining the Sertoli
cells rather than studying the germ cells.”
Johnson said this study has been ongoing
for the past 10 years, but has received fund
ing from the National Institute of Health
for only six of those years.
The greatest changes in sperm produc
tion occur after the age of 60, but the first
changes have been found to happen be
tween the ages of 40 and 50.
“Certainly not many people want to have
kids whenever they are that old,” Johnson
said. “However, it is possible because the
oldest case of paternity is recorded at the
age of 94.”
Today’s trends show that couples are
having children later in life and, especially
in cases of remarriage, older men have the
opportunity to father a child.
Statistics from the U.S. Public Health
Service show that from 1975 through 1983
the birth rate among women ages 30-34 in
creased 24 percent.
The study does not involve insemination
or conception, but it concentrated on
changes in spermatogenesis related to age.
With advancing age, the level of testoste
rone decreases in the blood stream, and the
amount of luteinizing hormone and follicle-
stimulating hormone are elevated because
older men have a less functional testicular
region, he said.
“The same percentage of degeneration
occurs in young and old men at a certain
point during meiotic divisions of spermato
genesis (the process of sperm production),”
Johnson said. “The only difference is the
young men produce sperm in higher num
bers.”
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Computer system helps
monitor bovine behavior
By Marc Weisinger
Reporter
Although a talking cow is probably out of the ques
tion, communication between people and cows is be
coming a reality after years of research and with the
help of computers.
The research, done by Dr. J.W. Stuth and Dr. Steve
Searcy, along with the Texas Agricultural Experiment
Station, has resulted in the development of a datalogger
computer system, known as the PDL 2, which allows
cattle to relay important information about their walk
ing, resting time and the amount of food they eat.
“We had problems in our early research because of
the length of time it took to gather our data,” Stuth
said. “We realized the use of a digital computer would
be faster than an analog computer, so we changed.”
Weighing less than a pound, the PDL 2 is the size of a
small notebook and is strapped to the cow’s front shoul
der. The datalogger is connected to sensors that mon
itor biting, stepping and chewing, Stuth said.
The main purpose of the research is the feeding sta
tion behavior, he said. These observations of behavior
will show how fast cows chew, how long they spend
searching for food and how much time they allocate to
find their next feeding spot.
“A rancher can watch the eating habits of his cows,
but by the time he sees a problem occur, it is too late,”
Stuth said. “This is why it is so important to study the
cows’ behavior.”
Answers to the behavior of cattle will help ranchers
decide when to rotate their cattle, where to put water
sources and where to place fences. Not knowing when
to rotate stock can result in a reduction of about 10 per
cent in the animals’ performance.
The use of computer simulations also is helping
ranchers make better decisions. These simulations show
how effectively a pasture is being utilized.
“The basic concept of foraging behavior must be
known before you can create adequate computer simu
lations,” Stuth said. “Our research is designed to ex
pand the knowledge of scientists developing these deci
sion support systems for ranchers.”
A company already is looking to license the PDL 2.
El Paso faces delay for clean water
Examiner
not indicted
by grand jury
HOUSTON (AP) — Harris
County grand jurors decided not
to indict Medical Examiner Jo
seph Jachimczyk for accepting
fees for autopsies on organ trans
plant donors.
The panel, however, did rec
ommend that Commissioners
Court review Jachimczyk’s salary
and outside income, that the
state’s inquest law be followed and
that medical examiner officials
view organs before transplants.
The jury’s decision Wednesday
was influenced by the fact that
what initially was viewed as
abuses has been curtailed in re
cent weeks, prosecutor Don
Stricklin said.
Under Texas law, medical e>-
aminers or their personnel must
examine organs of prospective
donors who die in hospitals be
cause of injury or traumatic acci
dents.
An anonymous source started
the investigation by sending pros
ecutors a copy of a Gulf Coast Or
gan Procurement Center letter
naming 15 people on whom Ja
chimczyk had done autopsies for
$1,000 each.
Stricklin said it was found that
the $110,000-a-year medical ex
aminer would have to have exam
ined many of the people as part
of his regular work.
The probe widened when it
was learned that, contrary to state
law, medical examiner officials
had not been viewing bodies and
conducting formal inquests into
causes of death before removing
organs for transplants, relying in
stead on hospital physicians’
opinions.
EL PASO (AP) — About 28,000 El
Paso Coun.ty residents face a delay
up to two years in getting clean
drinking water because of federal
regulations, officials said.
The federal government wants an
environmental assessment or impact
study before considering whether to
approve a plan to provide south El
Paso County rural slums with city
drinking water, said Darcy Frown-
felter, attorney for the Lower Valley
Water District.
The district was set up last year to
negotiate with the city and federal
governments to provide water to res
idents of the poor rural areas, called
“colonias.”
Under the preliminary plan, the
district would lease irrigation water
rights in the area, give the water to
El Paso for treatment and then buy
the water from the city at wholesale
price.
Frownfelter said an environmen
tal assessment would take about six
months and that a more detailed im
pact study could take one to two
years — and that neither process
would be affordable.
The environmental review is nec
essary to get approval for the deal
from the federal Bureau of Recla
mation, said Ron Johnston, an offi
cial with the bureau’s office in Salt
Lake City. He said the bureau has
not indicated which type of report is
required.
The National Environmental Im
pact Policy Act of 1969 requires a re
view of the environmental side ef
fects in the case, Johnston said.
“The conversion of some 1,500 to
3,000 acres of agricultural water
rights to municipal use is considered
a significant action,” he said.
Frownfelter said the Lower Valley
Water District can’t afford the esti
mated $150,000 cost of an environ
mental assessment or the estimated
$300,000 for an impact study.
Representatives of the water dis
trict, reclamation bureau and city
plan to meet Aug. 10 to discuss the
environmental reviews.
Professor says infanticide not uncommon
By Allison Seale
Reporter
The deliberate withholding of food or neglect
of children with birth defects or disabilities is
used as a passive means of infanticide in many
cultures around the world, an assistant professor
of anthropology at Texas A&M said.
Dr. Katherine A. Dettwyler is interested in
how cultural beliefs and practices influence the
physical development and mortality of children.
The low number of children with birth defects
in developing countries is not a result of good
health habits but of inadequate care, she said.
Dettwyler spent two years in the West African
nation of Mali studying this phenomenon and
how it relates to infant growth, feeding practices
and childhood development.
“People often marvel at how there are so few
mentally retarded and physically handicapped
people in non-industrialized societies,” Dettwyler
said. “They think people must be very healthy.”
In reality, she said, babies born with handicaps
often do not survive in societies that cannot af
ford to offer the support devices they need,
which include adequate medical care such as sur
gery and antibiotics.
Parents even reject the well-intentioned efforts
of western health professionals to keep the babies
alive, realizing that the infants’ chances for long
term survival are low.
In Mali, she said, the childhood survival rate is
50 percent.
The Bambara — the major ethnic group of
Mali — only begin feeding solid foods to their
children when they indicate an interest. The
child then feeds itself from the family’s commu
nal bowl. She said children who cannot or will not
feed themselves can become extremely malnou
rished and some die.
Toward the end of her stay in Mali, one of the
women in Dettwyler’s study gave birth to a child
with no arms.
“She left the child in the house when she came
out to talk because she was ashamed,” Dettwyler
said. “How will this child survive in a culture
where no one feeds the children?
“For an American family, it would simply be a
prolongation of the normal dependence an in
fant has on its parents for food. Eventually, the
child would be fitted with artificial limbs.
“In Mali, where people don’t usually feed chil
dren to begin with and where prosthetic devices
are not available, the outlook for that child is
bleak.”
Decision expected
on fate of ailing bank
DALLAS (AP) — Federal regula
tors were expected to decide as early
as Friday whether to award finan
cially troubled First RepublicBank
Corp. to a rival bidding bank or ac
cept the bank-holding company’s
own plan to recapitalize.
But industry analysts and bank of
ficials said it was also possible the
Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.
would declare the institution insol
vent and select a bidder at a later
date.
Management of First Republic-
Bank, which had net losses of $2.3
billion for the first six months of
1988, and three other bidders are
competing for control of the institu
tion.
The FDIG, which rescued First
RepublicBank with a $1 billion loan
in March, said it was considering all
options to resolve the company’s fis
cal crisis.
The FDIC could also declare the
company insolvent and run the insti
tution itself until a suitor was se
lected in a so-called bridge bank
transaction.
A bridge bank would be “one pos
sible scenario,” FDIC spokesman
Steve Katsanos said.
In a memo to First RepubicBank
managers Wednesday, the company
said it expected a decision by the
weekend. Spokesman Joe Bowles
said the memo was prompted by
speculation a bridge transaction was
imminent.
“As the decision time grows near,
we expect to see more of this specu
lation,” Bowles said.
Richard Fitzgerald, a Washington,
D.C. attorney who was chief counsel
for the Office of the Comptroller of
the Currency, said a bridge bank
could be used as a timing mech
anism.
“If the FDIC announced an
agreement in principle, a bridge
bank could give the winning bidder
— assuming it’s an out-of-state-bank
— time to get management in place,”
Fitzgerald said.
Under a bridge bank, an institu
tion is declared insolvent and the
FDIC operates it under a federal
charter for up to two years.
Local Briefs
Former student gives house to TAMUS
Texas A&M University System
officials and former students
have a place in Austin they can
call their own.
The 103-year-old Hirshfeld-
Moore House, formerly the
Hirshfeld House, was built in
1885 by Henry Hirshfeld, a Ger
man immigrant who came to
America in 1848. The house was
recently renamed by the Texas
A&M Board of Regents after the
facility was donated to the Uni
versity by a former student and
his wife.
Joe and Betty Moore, of Aus
tin, provided the resources for
the Texas A&M Development
Foundation to buy and restore
the two-story house at Ninth and
Lavaca in Austin. It is now used
by the TAMUS officials and for
mer students for meetings and
entertaining.
The Moores have provided re
sources for the Texas A&M Llni-
versity Press to produce the
Moore Texas Art Series, which
features the work of Texas Art
ists. Moore Communications
Center at A&M is named in
honor of the Moores because of
their support of public television
and radio on campus.
Universities called to assess education
Members of the 70th Texas
Legislature have called upon the
Texas A&M University System
(TAMUS) and the University of
Texas System to perform an as
sessment of higher education
needs in South Texas.
A joint task force will be orga
nized between TAMUS and the
University System of the South
(USST) after the Joint Legislative
Committee on Higher Education
in South Texas requested sugges
tions to improve the quality of
higher education there.
Administrators of USST and
TAMUS have met on several oc
casions and concluded that many
opportunities exist for possible
academic and research collabora
tion between the two systems.
The resolution that authorized
the task force calls for the imple
mentation of “a detailed analysis
of the advantages, disadvantages,
academic and economic desirabil
ity and feasibility of alternative
forms of collaboration and/or af
filiation” to be turned into the
Board of Regents by Oct. 3 1.
TAMUS has many long-stand
ing interests and established pro
grams in South Texas including
research and extension centers in
Weslaco and Corpus Christi
through the Texas Agricultural
Extension Service and the Texas
Agricultural Experiment Station.
USST includes Texas A&I at
Kingsville, Corpus Christi State
University and Laredo State Uni
versity.
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