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Growing New Cartilage
bsletten writes "Researchers at the Duke University Medical Center have successfully grown fat cells into cartilage, that they hope to use to repair/create new joints for patients. Normal cartilage does not repair itself well so this should be a boon to people with knee and hip problems." Cartilage doesn't repair at all, and there aren't any good replacements for it. I think teflon disks are the state of the art now, and they wear out eventually, which necessitates more surgery. Creating real cartilage replacements would be a major advance.
Mesenchymal Stem Cells (MSCs) can be isolated from bone marrow, are easily expanded outside of the body, and can be converted into a variety of tissues, including fat cells, muscle cells, bone cells and cartilage cells. Unlike adipocytes (fat cells), they are easier to grow, easier to isolate, less delicate and more naturally converted into cartlidge cells.
A company, Osiris is working on developing technology around these cells.
There is also a Science paper on these cells.
Full Disclosure: I work with these cells, and can routinely convert them into fat, bone and cartilige cells.
That is a very good point. It appears that genes will 'activate their junk DNA' in response to environmental stresses to allow for more rapid mutation and therefore enhance adaptation. Also, the human body used to turn off the gene that made the 'milk digesting' enzyme (lactase?) as part of the normal weaning process. Thirty-five percent of normal adults are lactose-intolerant for that very reason; they might be considered more normal than those who began drinking milk under environmental stress (hunger) and thereby needed to retain the lactase enzyme through their lifetime.
Now, this brings us to an interesting point. Perhaps in a different world, long-living cartilage people would survive better and be able to chase women into their forties/fifties once their lifespans increased, in fact All such longer-lasting genes would enhance survival.
But that is in a different world. In Our world, we supplant the role of genes by actively providing that which the gene lacks. There are therefore no longer any ordinary environmental pressures placed on the organism, so there is very little reason for a gene to change, within bounds. Medical Science is weakening the gene pool by eliminating a large part of the mechanism of natural selection.
What does this mean? We get lazy genes, and will never improve as a species except by direct manipulation of the body. It's kind of like how corn needs a human in the fertilization process because after years of hybridization it can no longer pollinate itself. That gene has lost its function due to man's intervention.
Could this happen to us?
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I live right smack in the middle of the good ol' US of A. I eat basically no refined white flour, little white sugar, and miniscule amounts of all the other things that health nuts are so afraid of. I eat healthily and I like to think that it shows. Although I'm 20 and I should be healthy anyway, I tend to get sick much less often and feel better most of the time than others in my age group. It's really not that difficult to eat well in an industrialized nation. It seems to me that it would be more difficult to eat well when your only options are whatever you grow, so that you're eating the same thing day after day, month after month, year after year.
About genetic engineering: evolution didn't get anything right or wrong. Evolution is just a process, it has no goal and does not produce inherently correct results. In any varied population with heredity, those traits that enable more reproduction and more successful children will tend to become more common. That's all it is. It has no concerns or goals or desires to improve. Evolution did screw a lot of things up, in fact. Our eyesight could be a lot better, and the optic nerve is attached very strangely. Our spine is amazing, but it doesn't take the stresses of standing upright all that wonderfully. Everybody has an appendix, a bit of flesh that serves no purpose but to occasionally get infected and possibly kill its owner. There are all sorts of screwy problems with our bodies as a direct consequence of evolution taking anything that's good enough, rather than striving for perfection. So if we can go in and fix things up a little bit, why not?
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A lot of children died in childbirth and of diseases in the first few years of life. In young adulthood you were at risk of dying either during hunting or war if you were male or in childbirth if you were female. If you lived beyond that you quite often lived to 60-80 years, ie a modern lifespan.
You're correct that there is no evolutionary pressure to develop repair of cartilage though, because evolution doesn't care about you much once you breed. Once you're beyond 35 there isn't a lot of breeding or fighting left in you, so you're not an evolutionary priority. Sure, maybe you serve an elder role, so there's some competitive advantage there. But you'll probably pass all that wisdom on by age 60 or so in a hunter-gatherer society anyway. More likely our survival beyond age 35 or so is just an evolutionary appendix.
Uh, you gotta read the article closer.
I don't have the ORS abstract on hand (I've been out of the cartilage research business for a couple years now) but even the spoon-fed Reuters wire feed mentions that the researcher (Guilak) doesn't have a clue whether he's actually using adipose (fat) cells or other stroma cells.
Whether they're adipose cells or stroma cells, if you separate them out of the body and put them on a culture plate, you tend to get cells which look a lot like fibroblasts. When you put fibroblasts into a three dimension matrix (the article doesn't mention which one, probably alginate or collagen-gag scaffolding) they tend to assume chondrocytic (cartilage) like properties. This is absolutely nothing new, except that Guilak's getting these fibroblasts from fat tissue rather than any other tissue in the body (fibroblasts are everywhere).
The real question is whether the chondrocytes are producing type II collagen (i.e. what you find in articulating surfaces like your knee joint) or type I (which is most of the collagen in your body, but completely unsuited for making knee joints). I doubt his cells are making significant levels of type II collagen. Even if they were, seeding cells into a matrix and getting type II collagen expression is nothing new, this has been done for years by various different groups (Ragan/Grodzinky at MIT, Koichi Matsuda (sp?) at Chicago/Rush, etc.).
Even if you're getting type II collagen formation, you also got to hope that the collagen is being assembled and oriented correctly so that it won't fall apart after a couple years, and I know of no current evidence that explains how this can be done outside of a developing body.
Sorry, this isn't a huge advance. This is just someone (Guilak?) trying to make news out of nothing.
The field of cartilage research is advancing greatly, and quite likely in another 5-10 years people will be able to recreate functional articular cartilage in an ex-vivo system. But there's still a lot more work to be done, and you're more likely to get the cells from a quick mouth swab than liposuction anyway.
Did anybody else read this as if it implied that the researchers at Duke ate a few too many burritos from Taco Bell?
Taco Bell actually has some of the healthiest fast food available. I've been losing weight by eating lunch and dinner at Taco Bell. Now you can't eat just anything, the only healthy items are the bean and supreme buritos as well as pintos & cheese. Tell them to leave off the cheese for even healthier food. Compare these typical meals that satiate me:
Taco Bell
Beef Burito Supreme: 430 calories, 16g fat, 9g fiber
Pintos 'n Cheese: 180 calories, 8g fat, 10g fiber
Total: 610 calories, 24g fat, 19g fiber
McDonalds
Quarter Pounder w. Cheese: 530 calories, 30g fat, 2g fiber
Medium Fries: 450 calories, 22g fat, 4g fiber
Total: 980 calories, 52g fat, 6g fiber
Trust me, dropping 370 calories, 28g of fat, and gaining 13g of fiber per meal makes a serious difference in your life. I've gone from 220 lbs to 185 lbs...and still going down.
Wow, someone on /. that actually knows something from real life experience. I'm to understand that your reclusive group is scheduled to be classified as an endangered species.
But now that you have popped up. May I presume to ask a question? (Well, I guess I will since I already have.)
I thought that any damage to cartilage caused it to calcify into bone after a long period of painful tenderness. I'm a wrestler, thereby being very familiar with cauliflower ear. For those who don't know, a painful condition whereby the cartilage of the ear becomes tender and inflamed after being pounded upon by a competitor (also developed from talking on the phone too much). Older wrestlers tend to have knobby, hard ear lobes.
How do you put new cartilage in without causing damage and the corresponding calcification?
Aah, change is good. -- Rafiki
Yeah, but it ain't easy. -- Simba
Damn! Here I was thinking I might get a cool new extoskeleton from all my blubber. With a kevlar scafolding, I was gonna be one bad mutha. Oh well, the diet must continue and I'm still just a weak, fat engineer.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
It's not a popular idea, but the diseases you mention are considered by some to be diseases of industrialization. Some people believe (and it's been my experience) that health is a function of the quality of food you eat. If you eat your refined white flour, white sugar, sodium benzoate, etc, expect to lose your hair, become impotent, develop adult-onset diabetes, have heart problems, become osteoporotic, etc. Yes, I'll acknowledge that the issues are a lot more complex than just what you eat, but it (food) certainly has a greater impact on health than most people give credit (especially /.'ers, who generally seem to think the HGP and Genetic Engineering is the solution to most problems).
Genetic Engineering: Because 2 billion years of evolution obviously got it wrong.
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This is a HUGE advancement! Not onlly do they have a way to "maufacture" cartilage, they are NOT doing it from embryonic stem cells! Stem cell research is much more advanced in Europe, and they actually have some cartilidge therapy based on stem cell research and injections; but the fact that this team has been able to do it with Adult Fat cells is mind breaking! This is of particular interest to me as I am one of thousands of people (probably millions) who have damaged there cartilage. I was in a car vs. rollerblade accident almost exactly a year ago and "shattered" the cartilage in both of my knees; in the US as stem cell research is so contriversial, my Drs said that there was little I could do, but hope it got better and look forward to knee replacements. (which they can only do twice btw and only last ~15-20 years; I am 20) While this is still very early in the research/test stage the idea that I may be able to run again is so exciting I don't have words for it!
-OctaneZ
Don't get me wrong,
This is a great discovery and all, but...
Why would I want a belly made of cartilage?
Have you ever considered what the average life span was up until several thousand years ago? If you don't live past 30 your cartilage won't wear out...so there is no evolutionary pressure to waste resources on repair mechanisms.
Yea, but as a soon-to-be-aging Generation X'er, I could not be more happy riding in their wake.
All these miracle drugs will be going generic just as I start losing my hair, erection, blood-sugar levels, ventricles, and bones.
(Yes, that was mostly sarcasm. You are right that our priorities are screwed up.)
The sad truth is that we are talking about the most self-absorbed generation in American history here.
For their whole lives, they have out-numbered and out-spent thier parents, and have dominated Western culture as a result.
The 60's were dominated by hippie culture because the boomers were bored college kids with more time and youthful rebellion than sense.
The 70's were the "me" generation because the boomers grew up, got jobs, and stopped pretending to give a shit.
The 80's were the "decade of greed" because the boomers got their first corporate options packages.
And in the 90's, with a boomer president getting his dick sucked in the White House, they finally feel like they have won, just as they are being forced to finally confront their mortality.
But blue hair and wrinkles is the least of their worries. In 2004, for the first time, the voting age population born after 1965 will actually outnumber the 1945-1964 boomers. Turn out the lights, boomers, the party's almost over.
I'm sure some indignant baby boomer will eventually mark this as "flamebait", leaving it unseen among the penis birds and hot grits posts, but fuck you... it had to be said.
I hope they also move their focus closer to diseases that prevent people in less developed countries from reaching the age at which many of these diseases develop.
Who is "they"? These scientists are experts in this particular field. Why would they "move their focus" elsewhere?
AIDS, trachoma, hepatitis, typhoid, cholera, yellow fever, malaria, and tuberculosis still rage. With climactic change and increased travel, they will continue to spread.
Only one or two on that list haven't been cured. What you need now are people good at organizing things to completely get rid of most of those diseases, you don't need scientists and doctors anymore, with the exception of those diseases not yet cured.
A balanced priority schedule in medical research takes these important social and ecological factors into account.
Are you implying that all money and effort should be focused on those specific diseases? That is completely ridiculous!
"And like that
Everyone wins.
Except the cute sea critters that get eaten by more sharks.
Obviously, regenerative cartilage and neurons are not an evolutionary advantage.
:)
That is poor reasoning. Just because a trait or ability hasn't developed doesn't mean that it isn't useful. It just hasn't HAPPENED. Maybe it will, maybe it won't. Evolution guarantees nothing.
There was a time before we developed intelligence, or the ability to walk upright. It would make no sense for an observer back then to look at us and say, "clearly intelligence is not useful, as these creatures have not evolved it."
We aren't DONE evolving, either. Maybe a few zillion years from now we will have the traits you are calling useless. And then, BOY, will YOU be changing your tune!
Losing the fat isn't necessarily desirable. Fat is a perfectly healthy food, provided you're exercising enough to burn it off.
When I'm backpacking, I need a good 4000+ calories a day. Mountaineers need 7000+ calories. I don't recall offhand what Tour de France cyclists need, but it was a godawful number.
You can't get that kind of caloric intake eating carrots, man. You *gotta* eat fatty foods to do it.
If you're a peasant working your ass off, a high-fat diet may be a necessity. Hence the termite. Choc-a-bloc full o' fatty goodness!
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First off, I have noticed two things in particular regarding this debate.:
1. This sort of thing has been done before with ears on mice, shark cartilage being used as 'donor' cartilage, etc., so why is this a big deal.
2. The ever popular Creationist vs. Evolutionist argument. Maybe we shouldn't mess with this sort of bio-engineering because it was created this way vs. evolution has not caught up yet with some of our advanced medicine and/or advanced medicine is part of our 'evolution'. (I generalize these arguments, but you'll see my point later.)
Now I have specific, real-life experience on this subject. I have had two knee surgeries involving ACL repair (one of which I am 5 weeks into recovering from right now), and some cartilage damage and repair on the other knee (which I had surgery on 2 yrs ago at the age of 22). Now, I style myself a pretty strict Biblical Creationist, but I also advocate scientific, technological, and medical research, and really love studying it, as evidenced by my daily reading of slashdot. Having had two knee surgeries, and injury to the cartilage, I think I am well qualified to comment on the two points above. First, I was thinking just yesterday about how great it would be to have my own cartilage regrown using some of the techniques described in this article. There are two sections of cartilage on either side of your knee between the two bones of your leg. On my one leg that was operated on 2 yrs ago, I damaged those two sets of cartilage, and when they repaired it, they had to completely remove one side because it was too damaged to do any good. Thus, my knee still gives me aches and pains from time to time. I would therefore really love to have them go back in and put good cartilage back in, I would think it would definitely help my joints and allow more physical activity on my part with fewer aches and pains (and hopefully less chance of arthritis later in life).
As for the Creation vs. Evolution argument, let me say that I am all for medical research. I'm not even sure I'm totally opposed to cloning humans, but I know I wouldn't want another me running around :). Cloning my own cartilage would be great! But, some of the evolutionary arguments I saw above are rather flawed. During my physical therapy, I have seen plenty of people well under the age of 30 (including myself - 24 yrs old). A previous person mentioned that due to our 30-40 yr life spans in our 'prehistoric age', cartilage didn't need to last 70+ yrs and so evolution just hasn't 'caught up' with us yet. Well, buddy, according to the Bible, it actually details people living well over 500 yrs after the creation of man, and a cap of 120 yrs was put on man after the Biblical flood. So from a creationist standpoint, that cartilage should last MUCH longer than 30 yrs to match up with a Creationist's beliefs. It just so happens that a Creationist would say that cartilage was not designed to have significant repairative properties. I would think this would be so because if cartilage did receive a strong blood supply, areas of our body, ie. ears, nose, knees, and other high use joints, would be too prone to injury and therefore would limit us in our daily activities more than having them be non-repairative. Just my theory, but I would ask a doctor for a better explanation of why cartilage is that way.
Another argument has been put forth stating that Creationists, religious folk, etc. are so backwards in their way of thinking that they are too stupid to realize the benefits of medicical research. I think I just showed that although I may not believe in Evolution (or special evolution, general evolution, whatever you want to argue about what to call it), that I whole-heartedly endorse science, and for purpose of this discussion, medical science. I have nothing wrong about learning about how our bodies work, and trying to make them work better, more efficiently, and longer. I see no harm in that. I also see no harm in choosing to believe in Evolution or Creation either way. Either choice is a belief. I, of course, believe that there is more evidence to support Creation. Others may believe there is more evidence to support Evolution. Please do not base your judgement of what kind of person a Creationist, or Evolutionist, religious, or atheist person is, without listening to them and really searching for facts, rather than just accepting popular belief.
You have to wonder how far how quick are we really going in terms of bio-engineered replacement parts for humans out there with real problems. Cartillage would be really great. A new major organ like a kidney for my really cool brother-in-law would be even better.
However, the real deal is when will the gee-whiz first break throughs eventually turn into real world results and are the projects being funded appropriately?
Those are questions that beg to be answered for the people living the problems.
I don't want to put down the results of the first real progress being shown in the field. I just sadly wonder how long will it take to start saving lives and is society as a whole supporting these efforts with enough resources?
ACK
This is a wonderful breakthrough, and will be useful to athletes, those with degenerative bone disease and the aged.
Unfortunately, however, I feel there is a predisposition in the medical research industry to focus on those diseases which the aging, affluent baby boomers will contract; baldness, impotence, type II diabetes, heart problems, osteoporosis, etc.
I hope they also move their focus closer to diseases that prevent people in less developed countries from reaching the age at which many of these diseases develop.
AIDS, trachoma, hepatitis, typhoid, cholera, yellow fever, malaria, and tuberculosis still rage. With climactic change and increased travel, they will continue to spread.
A balanced priority schedule in medical research takes these important social and ecological factors into account.
Goat sex free since 2001
Because of claims that shark cartilage is an effective treatment for joint problems, millions of sharks are killed each year in order to make cartilage supplements. Despite no scientific evidence to support these claims or other claims that shark supplements treat cancer, this chondroitic genocide persists.
Maybe now we can concentrate on growing our own cartilage instead of killing other animals for theirs. Everyone wins.
Read the rest of this comment...
Science/genetics = a species improving itself over time, to better fit a changing environment
The mechanism is different, and the time period is shorter, but "survival of the fittest" doesn't exactly apply to the human race these days either.
I have a ruptured disk in my back. I have been hoping for years that they would invent a technology to give me new disk cartiledge before I have to have a spinal fusion in 20 years.
Come on medical science, hurry up!
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Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
Okay, I've actually worked in the Vacanti Tissue Engineering laboratory, the lab that did the Ear-on-the-back-of-the-mouse experiment. I've since moved on doing other work on stem cells.
Cartilage usually doesn't repair appreciably on its own because it is one of the least densely populated tissues in the body. Cartilage is mostly extracellular matrix (ECM) proteins like collagen with a few cells scattered here and there to put out enough protein to maintain the tissue structure. It's also very poorly fed as few blood vessels travel through the cartilage so the few cartilage cells (chondrocytes) present operate at a slow metabolic pace too.
Cartilage has been an early and popular target of tissue engineering efforts. First of all it's a relatively homogenous, simple tissue. Secondly, alot of people have problems with damaged cartilage. What's done is that a porous 'scaffolding' of some material which will break down in the body is molded into the desired shape and then cells are 'seeded' onto the scaffolding with the intention that they will colonize it and grow. The breakdown characteristics are matched as closely as possible to the ECM buildup of proteins released by the cells. Eventually the artificial scaffolding is replaced by tissue. That's what the 'ear' on the back of the mouse is (by implanting it in a mouse, the engineered tissue gets fed in an 'in vivo' environment). Tissue engineered this way has yet to match the physical properties of normally produced cartilage, but there are approaches being investigated to improve these characteristics such as growing the tissue under a physical stress load.
The limiting reagent in this process is the supply of cells for seeding. That's why this story is news. During development, cells take cues from their environment and long range chemical signals to decide where they are and consequently what cell type would be apporpriate to differentiate into. However, not all of the cells in the body move into a final specific cell type. Some of them remain generalized as a pool or reserve of cells. Bone marrow is the easiest example of this. That's what has been taken advantage of here. The chondrocytes in this experiment were developed from stromal cells (not fat cells like the headline states). These are a less specific cell type than either chondrocytes or fat cells (adipocytes). They were grown in a physical environment and fed chemical signals that 'convinced' the cells they needed to become chondrocytes. Figuring out these conditions and signals is a nice piece of work.
There are quite a few pieces of research like this coming to light in the last two years. The direction of research in the stem cell field is moving towards trying to turn 'stem' cells from one particular tissue into developed cells of another tissue. Some labs are even trying to take fully differentiated and presumably committed cells and get them to turn into other cell types, sometimes referred to as 'trans-differentiation'. In that regard, this research isn't earth shattering, it's one more piece of confirmation. Also, if trans-differentiation is confirmed as a general trend, then you could conceivably get chondrocytes from many many different tissues in the body.
As a source for engineered tissue though, this has the practical advantage of being from a readily available source. Nicely done.
-Mario
That said, a diet of refried beans and cheddar cheese in a tortilla wrap is not the best way to eat healthy.
I dunno, peasants around the world survive on the stuff. It has all the required amino acids. If you lost the cheese you probably lose half of the fat, but I'm not sure if the enjoyment decrease is worth the calorie savings. Same with the tortilla. I get 26g of protein per TB meal this way, combine with soy milk and Total raisin bran in the morning and sometimes a late snack, and I hit the RDA for everything, while staying below 2000 calories per day.
and try to do a light workout a few times a week.
Yes, I do that - recumbent bike allows for workout and reading Slashdot at the same time. I do weight training as well, but harder to web surf while lifting (correctly).
From this page:
I have titled this "The Birth of a Monster" because Frankenstein can be read as a tale of what happens when a man tries to create a child without a woman. It can, however, also be read as an account of a woman's anxieties and insecurities about her own creative and reproductive capabilities. The story of Frankenstein is the first articulation of a woman's experience of pregnancy and related fears. Mary Shelley, in the development and education of the monster, discusses child development and education and how the nurturing of a loving parent is extremely important in the moral development of an individual. Thus, in Frankenstein, Mary Shelley examines her own fears and thoughts about pregnancy, childbirth, and child development.
I think your interpretation is fairly subjective, as is mine. Anyway, I recommend the website as you may need to consider another opinion beside your own.
A couple more things, and then I am done:
1) I am not trying to troll, just typing an opinion... try not to throw those accusations into your argument, however tempting. That's called an ad hominem attack, and I shouldn't let it slide by too many times without calling it.
2) Do you know how many 'failures' there were before Dolly the sheep was produced? I believe there were hundreds. And not all of the failures are going to be hideous mutated creatures, although some might. Some might have slight and undetectable genetic defects that won't reveal themselves for years. Question: should we allow such creatures to breed? I'm not so sure, myself.
3) Many people, in their zeal to progress scientifically, are willing to change reality so that it suits their aims. Try not to fall into that trap. It's the same one Dr. Frankenstein fell in to.
But thanks for a illuminating viewpoint. Please don't condescend to me again, however.
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Did anybody else read this as if it implied that the researchers at Duke ate a few too many burritos from Taco Bell?
Cartilage doesn't repair at all, and there aren't any good replacements for it
Actually, that's not true. Everybody who gambles in "fantasy football" leagues know that you can replace cartilage with... (drum roll)... cartilage. Several NFL wide receivers have had knee cartilage replacement (using cartilage from donor corpses), and have gone right back to sprinting past cornerbacks. So the best option to date has been cartilage from people who checked that "donor" box in their driver's licenses and then failed to wear a seatbelt.
Growing cartilage from fat cells is good news. It will probably make replacement parts cheaper and easier to get, so you won't need to be a millionaire athlete in order to afford getting your knee fixed.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
Sorry about the accusation of trolling - /.'s been going to hell in a vomit bucket with respect to that, and too many trolls have also said what you said.
However, if you look into Shelly's personal life, you will see she and her husband were vehement socialists.
Do you know how many failures there are in a typical in vitro fertilization attempt? Just as many as in Dolly. Furthur, those failures result in miscarrage, just like the failures with Dolly. In point of fact, examination of "natural" miscarrages shows most of them had genetic abnormailites. And with respect to preventing geneticly defective individuals from breeding: careful, you might get the Downs' Syndrome people up in arms.
As for condesension: re-read you post as I have re-read mine. Perhaps we both are falling into that trap.
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This is not an entirely new approach to repairing damaged cartiledge. It appears that the only thing new about it is that they are cloning one type of tissue into a *different* type of tissue. Cartilaginous replacements are being done in other ways...
In December I underwent knee surgery to remove a piece of bone about the size of a quarter that had broken off from one of the inner surfaces of my knee. At the same time a cartiledge biopsy was taken (i.e., a small sample of tissue) which will be cloned into a piece of replacement cartiledge which will be reimplanted in my knee if enough scar cartiledge doesn't form where they drilled a bunch of tiny holes in the end of the bone (yes, it was even more painful than it sounds for about two weeks following the surgery) to stimulate scar cartiledge growth where the chunk of bone was removed from where it had been mangling the cartiledge in my knee.
My doctor might be irked with me for getting them Slashdotted this way, then again they might not mind the exposure, but here's a URL for the type of surgery I went through, and more specific details on the why and the how of the cloning of replacement cartiledge.
http://www.iasm.com/ccc.html
Where in the hell did you get your science education? From the back of a Cap'n Crunch box?
"Evolution" is completely biological. It says nothing about the formation of the universe, galaxies, planets, or anything other than biological entities. Don't listen to Creationists who use the term "evolution" to refer to any piece of science that they believe contradicts their Bible. If you want to study the formation of the universe, check out cosmology. If you want to study the formation of the planet, check out geology. If you want to study the progression of life forms, check out biology (and biological evolution.)
The "special theory of evolution" states that two similar life forms that are in inertial Galilean reference frames in rectalinear motion relative to each other will evolve in roughly similar fashions. The "general theory of evolution" takes this one step further by positing that two similar life forms in any two reference frames will evolve in a roughly similar fashion, regardless of motion, direction, or acceleration. The presence of mass and radioactivity creates a curvature in the gene pool that makes genetic mutations far more likely.
Get your science from science books, not from Jerry Falwell. Thanks.
Just to point out that in fact cartilage does grow back, but very slowly due to its structure.
Bone, cartilage, etc are very close together in the way that they form.
In fact most of the human skeletal structure starts out as cartilage, and then resolves itself to bone in the later years(I believe 17-25 for males and females).
The cartilaginous structures in the body normally take a long time to heal due to the nutrient and blood supply being poor in collagenous areas.
Can't remember all the facts at the moment but bottom line is cartilage DOES grow back.
First, try to study what Shelly was for a bit. She was not writing about science per se, rather she was writing about the abuse of the worker. Much like the Russian story from whence we derive the word "robot" she was trying to say that the creation of artificial life would be used to create artificial slaves.
That said, now let's look at cloning. We aren't talking about growing babies in a vat here: you still have to have a human uterus to grow the kid in, and the result is that after nine months you have a baby. This is in no substantive way different from in vitro fertilization.
The result of a cloning experiment won't be "a creature without family, without hope of love, a hideous demon without a soul", any more than a child conceived via in vitro fertilization would be. It will be a baby, with a mommy, a brain waiting to develop, and all the legal rights anybody else has.
I realize this person is just a moderate grade troll, but I've hear this particular non-argument slide by too many times to let it happen again.
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