(And if you don't get why that specific query triggers the egg… come on).
This object played the same role as sperm would normally, triggering the egg to develop into an embryo.
It has been proposed that fertilization is the trigger for the egg production (ecdysteriod inducer) in parasitic copepods [ 14].
They then let the cells sit for up to 6 hours before triggering the eggs to develop by putting them into a culture medium containing strontium, which stimulates the release of calcium from the eggs' internal stores--the same signal that tells fertilized eggs it's time to start dividing.
It has been proposed that males depositing spermatophores triggers the egg-production in other parasitic copepods (Lepeophtheirus pectoralis) [ 14], but according to our observations using unfertilized laboratory animals, adult female L. salmonis produce eggs and external egg string also when males are not present (pers. obs., present study).
Egg activation relies entirely upon maternal factors that, without the addition of the sperm, can trigger the Drosophila egg to complete meiosis (Doane, 1960), modify the vitelline membrane (Heifetz et al., 2001) and initiate translation or degradation of some mRNAs (Macdonald and Struhl, 1986; Tadros and Lipshitz, 2005).
After this announcement, the steps required to trigger the Easter egg were discovered by Don Hodges, who used an emulator and a debugger to trace through the 25,000 lines of the game's code.
Transferring this information-packed nucleus into a egg is a first step; triggering the unfertilized egg to grow into a healthy animal is more complex.
In either case, a series of changes involving the hormones oxytocin and prolactin are triggered that cause the egg to mature and migrate.
Our data supports a model where the fluid in the lateral oviduct, which rehydrates the egg, triggers Ca2+ wave initiation at the posterior through mechano-sensitive channels.
