This answer also involves some speculations as the question is about a good theoretical framework for a science fiction.
You can find in this post about how sperm can be used to produce embryonic stem cells. It would still require an oocyte for doing that.
The question now is- Can you produce oocytes from a male?
You may fuse two X
bearing haploid spermatids to form a diploid cell with XX
. This cell will also have mitochondria and ribosomes — seems like a decent candidate. Gametogenesis has not been shown to happen in-vitro. Moreover a zygote will need a lot more cytoplasmic resources that you can get from a fused spermatid.
Plus there are imprinting issues as already pointed out by Chris.
Conclusion: Next to impossible
For your question "Does a man contain all the genes needed to make a women": yes he has but does not have the biological machinery to do that (exclusive of the womb).
However if you choose to send a female astronaut for this mission then there may be some hope. As Chris said, there are problems with homotypic fusions because of imprinting issues. But with a supply of ova there can be other ways:
- Make clones using SCNT: limitation is that there would be very little variability.
- Erase imprinting marks and fuse two oocytes: This has not been done yet but this is possible. At this moment we have technology (still incipient for therapy grade), for targeted genome editing. The basic principle involves fusing a DNA-endonuclease with a sequence specific DNA Binding Domain (DBD). Examples include Zinc Finger Nuclease, TALENs and Crispr-Cas. This study demonstrates an engineered system that can deaminate RNA in a sequence specific manner. Based on a similar principle it should be possible to link DNA-(cytosine/adenine)- methyltransferase or DNA-(cytosine/adenine)-demethylase to a sequence specific DBD 1. This system can be used for targeted epigenetic modification. This would have a little more variation than cloning because of meiotic recombination. Limitation is that there won't be any males, this would perhaps become an Amazonian Planet.
Make sure that your space-shuttle has a good biolab facility :P
1 Imprinting is generally implemented by DNA methylation which happens mostly on cytosines.