A 2021 study has recently begun to go viral, in which researchers in Japan were able to transgender a biological male catfish into a female with the use of soybean compounds.
The study, conducted by Kindai University’s Aquaculture Research Institute and located at the institute’s Shingu Station in Shingu, Wakayama Prefecture – which appears to have disappeared from their public research database on their website – documented how the use of a compound found in soybean protein called isoflavone, which can mimic the effects of female hormones such as estrogen, was used to transform male catfish into females.
The Japan-based paper The Mainichi did, however, report on the results of this study and the purpose of it on May 27th, 2021. The Japanese paper wrote:
A team of researchers in Japan has succeeded in making catfish all female with a compound found in soybeans — a development that promises to increase the production efficiency of this and other species whose females are more valuable than males in the food market…
