Curriculum Guide · Courses

Professor Susan Crockin

LL.M Seminar 2028 (cross-listed) | 2 credit hours

This seminar will provide an overview of the underlying and competing laws and policies arising from the assisted reproductive technologies (ARTs) that continually make front page news. Since the 1980 opening of the country’s 1st IVF clinic, The Howard and Georgeanna Jones Institute, amidst protests and pickets, courts and legislatures have struggled to create laws and policies in response to continually evolving reproductive advances. Topics will include: the legal status of the IVF embryo in the context of procreative rights; embryo and gamete cryopreservation, storage, disposition and mix-ups; posthumous reproduction; egg and sperm donation; traditional and gestational surrogacy; unique issues for non-traditional patients (singles and same-sex couples); the economic and regulatory aspects of the ARTs; and a brief look at the intersection of ART and embryonic stem cell research. Two experts in their respective fields will provide guest lectures on medical advances in ART and psychosocial aspects of donor egg and gestational surrogacy.