Science Turns Fruit Flies “Straight” Again

Two years after taxpayer-funded scientists in Illinois turned fruit flies queer, a pair of government-funded researchers in California is now helping straight fruit flies get it on.

If you think we’re joking on the first count, click here.

And if you think we’re joking on the second, here’s a recent report from Lab Spaces.net on the research that’s being done by University of California researchers Dr. Michael Polak and Dr. Arash Rashed …

As just published online in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B, “Microscale Laser Surgery Reveals Adaptive Function of Male Intromittent Genitalia” Polak’s research showed that without a doubt among the fruit fly species Drosophila bipectinata Duda, the males’ penile peculiarities assisted them in copulation.

Polak, an associate professor in the Department of Biological Sciences in McMicken College of Arts and Sciences at UC, used a laser ablation technique to cut off tiny “intromittent” spines on the genitalia of virgin male D. bipectinata Duda fruit flies.

“We refer to these genital spines as intromittent because they insert [them] into female external genitalia during copulation, and not because they insert into the reproductive tract,” Polak and Rashed explain in their paper.

Polak’s study concluded that the male genital spines serve two functions. When the spines were removed, the males experienced drastic reductions in ability to copulate and ability to compete against rival males for mates. However, if the males were able to copulate, they found that insemination and fertilization rates were not significantly different.

They’re not done yet, says Polak.

“We are using the laser for a variety of projects, including to surgically excise other genital traits and the tiny but elaborate male sex ‘combs’ used in courtship, and to study their adaptive function in sexual selection.”

Really? No … REALLY?

Who would have thought that during most severe, prolonged economic downturn in eight decades that we’d have plenty of money to devote to facilitating fruit fly copulation – gay and straight, no less.

Of course in fairness to Polak and Rashed, their research honestly isn’t materially more or less worthless than most of what government spends our tax dollars on …