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Female and male reproductive anatomy and physiology

Female and male reproductive anatomy and physiology

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WARNING: You may not want your children to view some topics or images in this section.

The female and male reproductive systems are amazing gifts of nature to ensure the future of the human race. Both males and females contribute half of their genetic material to create a new baby (in the form of an egg or 'ova' from the woman and as a single sperm from the man). These 'gametes' combine as one, transferring and shuffling the parent's genes to create a unique person. This gives the baby a varied genetic make-up, helping them to adapt to our changing environment, evolving into the next generation.

To give you an understanding of how we produce children, we will first take you through the basics of the female and male reproductive anatomy and physiology. Then we will explain exactly how conception takes place and a new baby is created. We will also include some interesting facts about how female and male babies start off their development in their mother's womb as looking sexually identical. Amazingly, it is not until about 12 to 14 weeks of the pregnancy that the baby's genetic coding starts to send messages to their genitals to develop into different sexual organs that will eventually make them a male or a female.

Related conception articles:

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Fertility & conception

Preparing your body for pregnancy

Nutrition, health & weight

Emotional & practical considerations

Diabetes, conception, early pregnancy

Epilepsy, conception and early pregnancy

Ovulation

How conception works

Shettles method