Ultimate Stem Cell Discovered

bofh31337 writes "Newscientist is reporting that the University of Minnesota has discovered a new stem cell in adults. It is thought this stem cell will be able to turn into any single tissue in the body." The article is kinda breathy, especially for New Scientist - but if this is true, which needs to be studied more, this will dramatically alter the landscape for stem cell research.

Comments

Patented ?

[boaworm]

Lets just hope that such a gene is not patented by an evil company trying to get every last dollar out of their discovery. This could be a huge brakethrough for all mankind, if they (the government) would only let us do the proper research.

Re:Patented ?

[ocie]

How many evil companies would even bother discovering things if they could not be pantented? Do you think new drugs just grow on trees?

Re:Patented ?

[Eslyjah]

This could be a huge brakethrough for all mankind, if they (the government) would only let us do the proper research.

What country do you live in that doesn't allow ADULT stem-cell research? Go ahead, do the research yourself in your garage...it's legal.

Re:Patented ?

[Psmylie]

I just think it's funny that they are, after a fashion, patenting a part of my body.

Re:Patented ?

[jayhawk88]

Do you think new drugs just grow on trees?

Some of them do.

Re:Patented ?

[ImaLamer]

I have to second that. [mee too!]

I'm someone who relies on drugs everyday. If they weren't doing it in part for the money there would be no reason for them to continue.

I think medicine-for-profit is bad, and has denied me a lot of treatment I could have received thus far. The other half if the non-doctors making medical decisions [read: HMO].

Medicine-for-profit isn't good, but it's better than no medicine at all. Many drug companies are making moves to offer even their most expensive drugs to seniors for a low flat rate cost.

They do spend billions, if not trillions on reaserch. If they didn't, no one else would.

Re:Patented ?

[Daniel Dvorkin]

Although the majority of new drugs are indeed invented by drug companies looking for a profit, most of the basic science that goes into drug discovery is still done by university research laboratories that get their money from government grants.

Re:Patented ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe new drugs don't, but pot does. Well it doesn't grow on a tree, but it grows in nature. Pot is cool and people think it should be illegal even dumber than George W.

Re:Patented ?

[cbrese]

There is a big difference between patenting a drug and a cell.

Re:Patented ?

[hublan]

I just think it's funny that they are, after a fashion, patenting a part of my body.

And the fact that I can even point to my granny and say: "Prior art"

Re:Patented ?

[shogun]

What? Like Bananadine?

Re:Patented ?

[Breakfast Pants]

I hope its bigger than the difference between patenting a drug and patenting the portions of the human genome

Re:Patented ?

[strictnein]

Well, it could very well be. The U of MN is the #2 (or #3) research university in the country (as it pertains to money given to them by the federal gov. and corporations). Especially its medical school.

Re:Patented ?

[Anonymous Coward]

I've known smarter people than George W. who thought pot should be illegal, but of course that doesn't say much. ;-)

Re:Patented ?

[Mercaptan]

It's a cell, not a gene.

And this research is preliminary enough that to lock it down under IP law would kill any chance of it having a significant impact on either the organization's bottom line or mankind's well-being.

Re:Patented ?

[Anonymous Coward]

> Some of them do.

99.999999% of them do.

Re:Patented ?

[koekepeer]

Which is changing rapidly with the increasing amount of funding universities get from big pharmaceutical companies :-(

Academic independence is very swiftly disappearing... believe it or not.

Re:more killings?

[Totonic]

No, of course not. It says the stem cells come from bone marrow, therefore all that would be required would be a bone marrow sample from a healthy adult. Sounds a lot more PC to those Christian fundamentalists screaming death.

ageless cells?

[Sebastopol]

The cells seem to grow indefinitely in culture, like ESCs. Some cell lines have been growing for almost two years and have kept their characteristics, with no signs of ageing, she says.

Two years? Damn, now that's an example careful experimentation. Although, I'd like to know what "aging" implies, and if she'd have to wait 80 or so years to see real human aging. Any biologists out there care to explain what aging looks like on the cellular level?

Re:ageless cells?

[Anonymous Coward]

It looks like simple mitosis, but the telomeres get shorter. When you run out of telomeres, the cell has reached the end of its life.

Re:ageless cells?

[boaworm]

Most cell knows when it is going to die. Our skincells for example are programmed to die after about 7 weeks, in this way, the skin does refresh itself and you have a nice healthy skin.
So.. if you clone a cell that is already say 3 weeks old, all clones from that cell will start of at the age of 3 weeks, having only 4 weeks left to live until "terminated".
This is what happened to Dolly, the cloned Sheep. Dolly's cells started of with the same biological clock as her "mother" (herself ? ;), so she is "ageing" very fast to catch up with herself.

Re:ageless cells?

[Anonymous Coward]

incidentally, this is what cancer does. it prevents the shortening of the telomeres, so cells that have turned cancerous don't "die".

Re:ageless cells?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yep. I meant to mention that...

Re:ageless cells?

[myc]

aging in cells, at a molecular level, usuallly means a shortening of telomeres from one generation to the next. This typically has other consequences as well, such as cell cycle arrest.

telomeres are special structures at the end of eukaryotic chromosomes that protect the ends and facilitate DNA replication of linear DNA. cells that have circular genomes (such as bacteria) do not have DNA ends and therefore do not have nor need telomeres. old cells have short telomeres and therefore have a harder time replicating their DNA. This is an overly simplified explanation, of course.

Re:ageless cells?

[CodeShark]

Keeping in mind that my answer is drawing from a micriobiology class I took in the dim dark ages (the late '80s), two years is a helluva long time because we're not talking about the age of the organism, we're talking about the number of generations of cells from the original that seem to be multiplying without observed mutation, etc.

In fact, we studied a particularly remarkable cancerous cell line that was significant in that even though the patient died something like twenty five years ago (?), the particular cell line has remained viable (it still divides into new cells true to the original) since then.

I haven't decided how related this is, but penicillin only became a useful antibiotic only after a couple of other inventors were able to find a growth medium (corn steep liquor) that allowed large quantities of the organism to breed true.

So if the New Scientist article is correct and there is not a generational OR a quantity limiting factor in these cells, my thought is that this is a Noble-Prize level discovery.

Re:ageless cells?

[sean23007]

Every other type of stem cell except for the Embryonic Stem Cell (ESC) exhibits rapid aging. By rapid, they mean hours to days before the entire cell line is dead (in culture). These cells have very short life spans and take a very short time to reproduce. By aging, they mean "unbidden mutation." ESCs don't do this, and apparently neither do these. This is an amazing advancement.

But you're right, the important thing is whether or not these cells can be put into a human (and work). Then we would find out what kind of aging (in the well-known human sense of the word) these cells experience.

Re:ageless cells?

[Anonymous Coward]

Cellular apoptosis (programmed cell death) is an extremely complex event, and honestly not well understood. The number of signal cascades that support apoptosis, and the number of cascades that are against it, are absolutely mind-boggling.

For what you guys are talking about, shortening of telomeres has long been believed to be the reason. This theory may well have been superceded while i wasn't paying attention, however.

Re:ageless cells?

[Fragmented_Datagram]

There's an enzyme that is present in embryonic cells known as "telomerase" that allows the cells to multiply millions of times without ever "aging". Whenever chromosomes are copied, part of the ends, known as "telomeres", are chopped off. Telomeres don't contribute anything to the cell's characteristics, except to be a sort of built-in clock that determines how long the cell lives. Once the chromosomes have duplicated enough times that there's no more telomeres on the ends, then the chromosomes become damaged from the duplication process and usually the cells cease to function as a result. If, however, you add the telomerase enzyme, then you can keep these cells alive forever because telomerase will continually replace the chopped off telomere end.

Re:ageless cells?

[StaticEngine]

Any biologists out there care to explain what aging looks like on the cellular level?

Their cillia starts to fall out in the front, or in a circular patch over their oral pore. They get a lot more moody, and thinner, and they tend to say lots of things like "Eh, my endoplasmic reticulum isn't what it used to be!", and "In my day, they didn't teach Mitosis in school, you just learned about it the hard way!" If the cells can afford it, they try to move south for their last days, which explains the appearance of some higher mammals...

Re:ageless cells?

[chihowa]

Now IANAB (I am not a biologist) but...

Would that be useful in generating clones from us to used for transplants (spare parts) and such?

Does this accelerated aging stop when it has reached the age of the host? (How does it know how long it has been aging? IAONAB (I am obviously not a biologist!))

I know... I read too much sci-fi

Re:ageless cells?

[Isldeur]

There has been a direct correlation found between cell age and the length of certain sections of the genetic code called "telomeres". As a cell ages, these telomeres grow shorter. Scientists believe that this may be one of the ways cells "know when to die".

Re:ageless cells?

[Rothfuss]

The guy you are responding to was not a biologist either.

He also may have been smoking crack.

Look here for a bit on cell aging theory.

Re:ageless cells?

[6EQUJ5]

Don't forget, an immortal cell is... cancer. That double-edged sword again... :(

Re:ageless cells?

[Anonymous Coward]

They were probably HELA cells. An extensively studied cell line from a Helen someone or other who died of cancer a while back.

Re:ageless cells?

[praedor]

For cell cultures, ageing generally refers to senescence. Most normal cells, once cultured, can manage about 50 doublings before they senesce and will grow no more. Large, scattered areas of the genome are silenced, the mitochondria deteriorate and produce more damaging oxygen radicals per unit ATP (energy) produced, which leads to oxidative damage to proteins, cell walls, and genetic material. On top of that, the repair machinery becomes less and less capable.

Basically, the cell shuts down and then wears out. That is ageing on the cellular level.

The standard way around this is to immortalize cells. This can mean anything from simply growing lots of normal cells out and selecting those cells that manage to keep going - they've acquired mutations that permit continued cell divisions. A faster and easier way is to either transfect the cells with an immortalizing defective virus (cancer causing outside of cell culture) or mutagenizing the cells chemically or radioactively to obtain a similar result - mutant cells, with cancer-like tendencies, that can grow indefinitely. You can also start cultures from human tumors...they are already at least partially immortalized.

With a lot of the stem cells, you can get them to grow and grow indefinitely if they are handled properly - don't let them grow too dense, continual tissue culture media changing to help prevent the build up of signal protein and signal molecule gradients that would drive the cells to start differentiating. Once they differentiate, barring mutations as mentioned above, their lifespan is limited.

Re:ageless cells?

[praedor]

It's not even always that simple. Cancer cells evolve means of sidestepping the telomeric shortening in at least several poorly understood ways.

SOME cancerous cells have a perpetually turned on telomerase at some level to maintain the chromosome ends. Others seem to make do without apparent telomerase activity...recombination or other means. As a side note, fruit flies (Drosophila) do not have telomeres in the classic sense. They rely entirely on recombination events to produce repetitive chromosome ends that do the same thing as telomeres.

Finally, telomeres are only a part of the puzzle of ageing. They are not the end-all be-all of immortality. Ageing is a complex interplay of biochemical and genetic events. Programmed senescence (telomeres play a part in this) as well as simple wear and tear.

If you gave yourself a telomerase-stimulating drug in the hopes that you would slow down ageing, what you would actually end up doing is enhancing your risk of developing cancer.

In any case, telomeres shorten with each cell division (except in germ cells) until a critical point is reached. Then proteins that interact with the telomeric DNA begin shutting down genes adjacent to the telomeres and activate others which subsequently alter the expression of other genes. Mitochondria deteriorate with age regardless of telomeric shortening and gradually produce more and more damaging oxygen radicals which do runaway damage to the mitochondrial DNA, mitochondrial proteins, and its cell wall which exacerbates the production of radicals at the expense of energy production. Other parts of the cell take damage from leaking mitochondria, from your nuclear DNA to cellular proteins and cell wall lipids. Random damage to DNA also takes its toll outside of the oxygen radicals. Repair proteins become themselves damaged and are expressed at lower levels so your damage repair systems degenerate too. You can't even hope to increase their production because if you produce too much of a "good thing" the cells sense this as a problem and apoptos/die.

There is a lot more to ageing than telomere shortening, to cut it short.

Re:ageless cells?

[oo7tushar]

cancer does not necessarily do that.

Typically cancer can be short lived (compared to human life). Cancerous cells multiply very quiclkly but they don't use up all their telomeres and many work in ways to "infect" surrounding cells. Consider this. The average cell divides 60 times. This allows for a heck of a lot of cells and means that cancer can just go away with time if all they did was multiply.

Instead cancerous tends to cause short term problems, over time it can be treated by just keeping the person alive.

Other forms of cancer target other cells. Cancer is afterall, a mutation so they can mutate quickly. Mutations occur very often in the human body but almost all result in a lethal mutation that can't live. Thus just lenghtening telomeres won't necessarily be a bad thing. Once they are put into the body or they convert to another form they will start to loose those telomeres.

Also, telomeres only help stabilize nuclear material division (division of chromosomes and making copies) so it has very little to do with cell death. Rather, cell death is controlled by the chromosomes themselves.

I look forward to what they will use the stem cells for I'm pretty sure that in 40 years I will need my heart or stomach patched up.

Re:ageless cells?

[aswang]

A lot of people are mentioning telomeres, but the reduction of telomere length is not the only possible determinant of aging. Some postulate the existence of actual clock genes that regulate the timing of intracellular processes, which have already been found in lower animals such as C. elegans.

But a huge determinant of cellular aging that isn't genetically encoded is simply physical damage due to normal cellular metabolism. Cells need energy, energy is generated by our mitochondria, mitochondria need oxygen, the presence of oxygen can generate reactive oxygen species which cause oxidative damage. (Lipofuscin granules--unmetabolizable oxidized debris that commonly accumulates within old cells--are evidence of such damage) While dividing cells can obviously repair themselves, some damage is simply irreversible. In the end, there are really only three ways for a cell to go: apoptosis, necrosis, or transformation into cancer.

Re:ageless cells?

[bonoboy]

When they say there's no sign of aging, they more than likely mean that the progeny of one cell doesn't have shorter DNA fragments than the parent cell.

As you go through life, you're bombarded by radiation (like UV) which actually destroys DNA in different places. In effect, what you get is shortened lengths of DNA, due to their being cut.

This is exactly what they were worried about with Dolly. If Dolly was cloned from a cell which already had shortened DNA, would all her cells start that way, and the progeny get shorter quicker? In other words, would she be born with the effective age of her mother clone?

I believe this is the main mechanism behind the Hayflick Number, which is a measure of how many times a cell can reliably divide before it will stop dividing. I think it's 21. So they were worried that Dolly would have less divisions left, and would die young.

It's been a while since I was in the lab, so someone please feel free to correct me if I've steered too far of course here.

Re:ageless cells?

[Dyolf Knip]

Once they differentiate, barring mutations as mentioned above, their lifespan is limited

There was a show on Discovery Health about regrowing limbs a few days ago. The example they gave was a Salamander; if it loses a limb the cells on the wound revert to an earlier form, look around and start duplicating and rebuilding the limb. Is this basically what you would do with a human? Smear stem cells on the stub and they'll regrow as the lost body part?

Re:ageless cells?

[koekepeer]

Her name was Henrietta Lacks, and show some respect for this black lady who's cells have made a lot of research possible, you ignorant... clueless... individual. (trying to be somewhat polite for a change ;-)

The penicillin the previous poster talked about is to avoid contamination of your cell-culture with bacteria. But, in our lab, we generaly don't use it. If you handle materials correctly, you won't get infection (and hence, won't need penicillin/streptomycin/whatever).

Anyway, we're discussing cancerous cells now, a normal, dormant tissue that started to show abnormal growth. The cells discussed in the article are stem-cells, they are supposed to have the ability to divide indefinetely, since they provide the basic supply for new cells that eventualy will differentiate to their normal function.

Re:ageless cells?

[PEdelman]

Salamanders, and "lower animals" in general, is quite a different story than mammals. We've lost our ability to regenerate, probably by introducing a system which limits the maximum amount of cell divisions normal cells can have.

Now, smearing stem cells on a wound would probably have no effect at all, because mammals are completely formed in their developmental stage. Once (for example) an arm has formed, the signalling to form an arm stops. So to regrow an arm, the right signalling compounds have to be applied next to the stem cells, and then a new arm can theoretically be formed, but only by gowing through complete embryonic development.

Re:ageless cells?

[CodeShark]

Thank you for filling in Henrietta's name.

By the way, the reason I mentioned penicillin had to do with the fact that Fleming originally discovered the microbe in the late '20s, but it wasn't until early in WW2 that technology came into being that allowed the mass production of the drug.

The relevance (which my underslept brain wasn't providing the other day) is that it seems like this new technique might have the same type of multiplicative effect on stem cell research that corn steep liquor had on penicilllin)

Re:ageless cells?

[jabens]

Aging in this context has to do with telomeres, and the progressive excision of these DNA bits each time the cell divides... you can't actually see wrinkles on the cells, or eyeglasses or canes

Standard Fundie Alert!

[Tackhead]

> A stem cell has been found in adults that can turn into every single tissue in the body.

Oh no! Extracting and growing these cells to cure diseases would be like killing millions and millions of clones of yourself! It's like having a million abortions, or even worse, committing suicide a million times over! We must ban research immediately! If God had wanted us to be healed, He wouldn't have let us get sick in the first place!

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[BillTheKatt]

Oh no! Microsoft has released a new product! It's a conspiracy, they want to dominate the world, it has security holes and crashes a lot. Microsoft sucks, Linux rules! Linux is great, and everyone should use it! Free software forever!
There are many types of fundamentalism my friend.
This article is more proof that the liberals decrying the goverment's reasonable restrictions on ESC's are morons. If this research proves true (and that's an IF) ECS would be unnecessary.

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[Bob Uhl]

Moron. The difference is that these can be harvested without killing the adult. Embryonic stem cells could only be harvested by slaying the embryo.

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[Eloquence]

Yeah, here's your embryo. MURDER! MURDER! I can see a face in that right cell!

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[Computer!]

This article is more proof that the liberals decrying the goverment's reasonable restrictions on ESC's are morons.

Thanks, Bill. Indeed, if pre-born stem cell research hadn't been kept controversial, there may have been no need for this discovery. If it hadn't been for pro-lifers bitching and moaning, we may have never found this way to harvest long living stem cells.

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[Anonymous Coward]

I feel sorry for you. It was obvious that the guy was satiring.

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[linzeal]

Another problem with this charecterization is that it implies a strict dichotomy. The luddite pro-lifer versus the progressive pro-choicer. The problem with the way I've been seeing it for awhile now is that pro-life is the progressive stance on this issue for multiple reasons.

1. Human rights are granted on the basis of human need for compassion not dehumanization.
2. Abortion's main proponents are the rich and middle class who rationalize that a child risen in poverty is a burden on not just the mother but society. Bill gates as Ted Turner have donated to population control groups. Here are some "choice" quotes from Margeret Sanger the founder of Planned Parenthood,

"The maternity facilities for slum mothers are injuirious to the community and the race. Charity will only prolong the misery of the unfit"

"We do not want word to get out that we want to exterminate the Negro population"
3.The chicken littles of population control do not realize that to expand into space colonization we may need the kick in the ass of overpopulation not a stable population or population death.

My website does not resolve and I'm fighting with my webhosting provider to get it working.

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[God_Retired]

I love moronic posts like this. Just when I thought /. couldn't get worse, what with all the reckless multiplying of MicroSloth lovers, then we get this. I'm looking for a new place to get intelligent dialoge as opposed to this drivel. Later....

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[linzeal]

Ok, now that you have dehumanized it by mockery does that make it less human? I think not. Whether you believe it or not we all once were just like that and through gestation birth and x amount of years we are the same being. You are setting up an arbitrary age at which human life becomes valuable and it could 5 years old or 5 days old it would have as much simple but wrong justification.

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[Eloquence]

I think I'm going to archive your post. This is something I can tell my children about.

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[Anonymous Coward]

You are setting up an arbitrary age at which human life becomes valuable

How old are you? N+1...

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[Anonymous Coward]

> It was obvious that the guy was satiring.

Satire:
The answer most people give when asked "What's the word for that rubber thing around a wheel?" ("Oh yeah, 'sa tire!")

Fundies excepted.

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[Anonymous Coward]

My website does not resolve

Probably becuase it, much like you personally, is imbecilic. If you look in your TOS, there's a clause about "not wasting our bandwidth on stupid shit."

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[Anonymous Coward]

Stupid Fundies.

But, damn; stem cells from adults? We murdered all those unborn people for nothing? Well, there's always Planned Parenthood...

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't you mean N-1?

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[Jazu]

IANABiologist, but I seem to recall that they can be harvested from umbilical cords or embryos that are already dead(you could say that violates the sectity of their body, but that's a matter of opinion.)

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[Anonymous Coward]

Nice argument of the beard.

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[Jazu]

:Ok, now that you have dehumanized it by mockery does that make it less human? I think not.

No it doesn't, but two cells aren't neccessarily a human yet.

:Whether you believe it or not we all once were
:just like that and through gestation birth and x
:amount of years we are the same being.

Really? That hadn't occurred to me!

:You are setting up an arbitrary age at which human life becomes valuable

As does everyone else. There is no standard, accepted opinion on where life begins.

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[linzeal]

No it doesn't, but two cells aren't neccessarily a human yet.

What are they then? Oh, wait they are human.

As does everyone else. There is no standard, accepted opinion on where life begins.

Biology's "opinion" would be at the moment of conception a new living individual is formed.

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[sketerpot]

If I have a nosebleed and some of the blood cells get on my finger and I hold them up to look at, what am I looking at?

Humans? They are human cells. But what does it mean to be a human life? Having living human cells? Having a human mind? I choose mind.

In my opinion this is ethical as long as no human minds are destroyed. Then I become very opposed....

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[linzeal]

No you are distorting this. We are not looking at human cells in general we are looking at the distinct human cells in that picture. Those are the embryonic cells of a complete human being. A human mind without a human body is worthless and vice versa and at that stage they are indistinguishable if you believe that our perception is shaped in part by genetics.

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[Nightpaw]

Yeah, here's your embryo [ama-assn.org]. MURDER! MURDER! I can see a face in that right cell!

I don't know; it kind of looks like a butt to me.

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[matroid]

Although this conversation is only a few short steps from namecalling, I'd like to point out that fundamentally, the issues being discussed here are tremendously important to scientists, ethicists, and human-kind in general.

At what point does a living organism become autonomous? At what point can we consider an human cell, a full-fledged human? Is it ethical to create a human-based organism just to destroy it?

These ethical considerations were discussed in last month's Scientific American.

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[junkgrep]

Those cells are essentially recipies for creating a functioning human being (most people think that they are "blueprints" but this is just not so). However, if they are not placed in the right environment, they will never even have a chance at becoming a human being.

So while I agree that there's no arbitrary line at which one can say "now it is worthy of human rights!" I really can't see how you could possibly think that it is at that stage. It is a blob of jelly with chemical polymers. The fact that those polymers could be used to grow a human being is irrelevant: the point is that they have not YET done so. I can't see how not allowing them to develop further is any worse than simply not concieving them at all.

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[linzeal]

Ah, but they are concieved and therefore a human being because the progress from conception to death is from those same cells. You can not delineate any stages of growth where something is not a complete human.

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[junkgrep]

If I split those cells, I can get two, or even three humans! Or, if they do not successfully implant in a womb (which naturally happens much of the time) they simply will not grow any further. I can see an argument for respecting a fetus, but a blob of jelly with genetic code, and no nervous system to speak of? How do you justify giving that moral status?

The fact that those cells COULD grow into a functioning human being does not change the fact that they HAVE NOT, and NEED NOT: and detroying them cannot possibly be equated with destroying a functioning human being. I simply don't see why you think this word-parsing over "complete human" should be in the least convincing.

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[statusbar]

take it a bit further.

"Every sperm is sacred
Every sperm is great
If any sperm gets wasted
god gets quite irate"

(what show did that come from?)

--jeff

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[Alsee]

concieved and therefore a human being because the progress from conception to death is from those same cells. You can not delineate any stages of growth where something is not a complete human.

Perhaps you can help me? I'm still a bit fuzzy on the moment life begins, the point where you have a complete human. I keep hearing "at the moment of conception", but, well, I'm still not clear on this point.

Is it when the sperm first comes in contact with the egg? Hundreds of sperm swarm the egg and try to work their way in. The first sperm to make contact isn't always the one that succedes.

Is it when the sperm and egg cell membranes begin to merge? Before the cytoplasma comes in contact?

Is it when the cytoplasma of the sperm comes in contact with the cytoplasm of the egg? Before any mixing has occured?

Is it when the sprem and egg cytoplasm mix? But the sperm DNA is still outside the nucleus, and non-functional.

Is it when the sperm's inactive DNA enters the nucleus?

Is it when the sperm DNA activates and both sets of DNA work together on protine synthesis?

Is it when the both sets of DNA begin replication?

I realize I have severely simplified the process of conception here. If you can help narrow things down, perhaps we can go into greater detail later?

Thanx!

-

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[linzeal]

No problem.

The book that I have right now and a cool program as well that shows the step by step process.

From what I understand of human embryology the start of a distinct human life from the sperm of one human being and the ovum of another would be at the zygote stage when both the sperm and ovum cease to be seperate things and cojoin in the creation of a complete monocellular human being. For it is at the genesis of the single cell zygote where nothing is needed except time and nutrition to continue the process of building a new and complex human life.

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[sjames]

Those are the embryonic cells of a complete human being.

Which, if in a womb might or might not become 1 or more human beings. They could split off and form twins. Or in later division might form triplets. One of the twins could be reabsorbed into the other. Does that mean that some 'individuals' are actually two people? Or that it is possable to be born already guilty of murder?

The 'wierdness' doesn't end there. They may (for many reasons) fail to successfully implant. The failure can be complete and the woman would never know the fertilization happened. The failure could be partial and will result in an early miscarriage (possably not even recognized as such if early enough).

It is even possable for two entirely seperate embrios (produced from 2 fertilized ova, that is, fraternal twins) to fuse into one. The result is a matrix. It is not all that uncommon, and often has no consequence of importance for the surviving twin.

Given all of that, I find it hard to grant personhood to a small collection of human cells.

Re:Standard Fundie Alert!

[linzeal]

Till 14 days have passed "twinning" can occur and yes it is a complex ethical issue on the issue of whether to deign something at this stage a human being or something capable of manifesting into one or more human beings. Regardless these "small collection of cells" will be responsible for the makeup of every human being outside the womb so therefore are complete in that sense as nothing is added to them except nutrition and time.

Re:more killings?

[pclminion]

This was the first post to the discussion, so I'm at risk of feeding a troll, but here goes:

are you going to start killing adults now too?

No, I believe we'll start healing them. Stem cells taken from your own body could be used (eventually) to produce entire new organs for transplantation. Nothing could be better than a transplant made of tissue from your own genetic makeup. This would be the end of anti-rejection drugs and the terrible lifestyles that some transplantees live.

When will the Christians of the world wake up and realize that their "moral standards" are seriously fucked up?

Stem cells from Liposuction can be used too

[Therin]

One other very promising source of stem cells is from liposuction - check out StemSource for details

Re:Stem cells from Liposuction can be used too

[4of12]

One other very promising source of stem cells is from liposuction

This is GREAT NEWS!!!

I know of a great many people with plentiful supplies of fat cells that would be raring to go, donating them to science, or to helping to replicate a new liver. Heh, especially after the liver got so trashed in conjunction with the accumulation of a massive beer belly (see, it all fits together).

Re:Stem cells from Liposuction can be used too

[Rude Turnip]

Your own fat ass: It's for much more than just soap now, it can save your life!

Re:Stem cells from Liposuction can be used too

[alkaloid]

Hey! Is that a fat joke?!?!?!

Re:Stem cells from Liposuction can be used too

[2Bits]

And why not make a business out of that?

Hey, you've got extra need for stem cells, come on here, we make a deal. If you buy 2 pounds, you get the third pound half price. Good deal, eh?

Re:Stem cells from Liposuction can be used too

[sledd_1]

Great, there goes the raw materials supply for all my soap products.
"We were selling rich women their fat asses back to them"

Re:Stem cells from Liposuction can be used too

[mojotooth]

Suddenly I find myself rather inspired to donate my body to science. I guess because I just realized it might be useful.

Re:Stem cells from Liposuction can be used too

[Rude Turnip]

The number of replies to this thread that deal with making soap from fat asses: 2. One of which I made earlier.

I knew it.

[MisterBlister]

I just knew it.

Right.

[Anonymous Coward]

So basically, my brain is just a Beowulf cluster of these?

OT Reply

[Anonymous Coward]

It says the stem cells come from bone marrow, therefore all that would be required would be a bone marrow sample from a healthy adult. Sounds a lot more PC to those Christian fundamentalists screaming death.

Not to start a giganitic flame war, but being 'prolife' (lets skip the whole 'its already gonna be aborted crap, and get to the meat. Getting stemcells from fetus' is a prochoice activity) isn't being a 'christian fundamentalists'. I'm prolife and FAR from fanatical (evolution and bigbang are things I study and believe in). Just something to keep in mind...

-FortKnox : Posting anonymously, cause this is OT.

Yet to be Confirmed

[The Raven]

The tests seem to hold promise, but it is not confirmed yet. But if it works... ooh, the excitement. 'Free' stem cells, with no issues about embryos and cloning is a dream come true to scientists working in this field.

I wonder how long before practical applications of this research become available... five years? Ten?

Raven

Re:Yet to be Confirmed

[swb]

I wonder how long before practical applications of this research become available... five years? Ten?

If the economy keeps tanking and health care costs keep going up, I'm guessing that the practical applications will be unavailable to anyone with less than a 7 figure income.

Re:Yet to be Confirmed

[sketerpot]

Yes, this can be very good. I sincerely hope that it works and people can go back to debating abortion instead.

Just think of the potential of this. You think a lot of people died on sep. 11? More could be saved by this.

Now to help make the abortion debate moot, we could use some good reliable birth control. I don't think abybody likes abortion. I mean, not as a recreational thing.

Re:more killings?

[susano_otter]

When will the Christians of the world wake up and realize that their "moral standards" are seriously fucked up?

Care to share your definitions of "Christians", "moral standards", and "fucked up" with the class? Or am I also feeding a troll, here?

the best news is....

[Restil]

If you donate stem cells from willing adults, you don't have all the ethical arguments you get with harvesting human embryos. Not really sure which side of that argument I fall on, but if we can avoid the argument altogether and concentrate on the science instead, things would move along faster.

Hopefully these stem cells are as useful as the embryonic ones are.

-Restil

Re:the best news is....

[Saige]

Well, the big point from this research may be that the only person needed to "donate" the stem cells may be the exact person needing the treatment. If every adult human being has these stem cells, then there is the possibility for a person to grow cells (or organs or such) from their very own cells, with their very own DNA.

This not only avoids most of the ethical problems completely, it should eliminate any worries about rejection of the new cells, since there isn't a difference between them and the ones already there.

I hope this turns out to be true, this would be so huge for curing diseases, reparing damage caused by accidents or neglect, and in general really helping to increase human longevity.

Re:the best news is....

[SilentChris]

"This not only avoids most of the ethical problems completely"

Except for those people against stem cell treatment entirely. I'm kind of afraid it will lead to other "worse" things ("uber-tissue").

Re:the best news is....

[praedor]

Not necessarily. The person needing a treatment may need the treatment due to a genetic problem. This problem would exist in all their cells, even the potential stem cells.

There would need to be a source outside of oneself for such cells in cases where the problem (or a potential problem aside from the one requiring the immediate treatment) is genetic in nature.

Of course, if there is a large enough supply of such cells within a patient, and they could be properly cultured and propagated, genetic engineering could be attempted to fix certain genetic mutation before going on to use the cells for treatment. Depends on how much time you have to treat the problem and the nature of the genetic abnormality.

Re:the best news is....

[Snover]

... this would be so huge for curing diseases...

Something I wonder about is if this could be used to cure EVERY disease. I mean, if this can only cure "almost" any disease, which are the ones that are still incurable? I imagine that there are inevitably going to be some things that can't be cured by harvesting (cloning) a new organ, or by replacing cancerous cells with healthy cells...what diseases are these? (Brain damage caused by stroke?)
A more elaborate plan for severe disorders such as AIDS or advanced forms of cancer is to reprogram these "base" stem cells to destroy and rebuild each cell in the body, replacing each old cell with a new cell that has transformed to take the place of the old cell. However, this brings up the issue of what happens when you replace brain cells? Is the information retained? The cells can't be identical to others if they're cancerous...would there be a way to code cells to brute-force strip cancerous instructions? Saying this makes humans...and all creatures...sound amazingly similar to computers...is that all we are? A species of computers reprogramming ourselves? That's a scary thought.

Patent?

[crotherm]

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof, and though the team has so far published little, a patent application seen by New Scientist shows the team has carried out extensive experiments.

If this pans out to be what they think they have, I just hope that the patent holders do not charge and arm and a leg for the world to use it. Sure growing organs and such is a longs ways off, but the potential is astounding. Some discoveries should belong to the public domain, like cures and other medical discoveries. And I understand that research costs money, but maybe we as a society would be better off if governments not spend so much on space when there are so many worthwhile medical research programs that arin dire need of funding. And if the governments fund it, then the knowledge could be public.

Re:Patent?

[Dancin_Santa]

If this pans out, you won't have to worry about the price. You can simply grow arms and legs as necessary. :-)

Dancin Santa

Re:Patent?

[CrosseyedPainless]

May I point out that if medical science gets much better, we're going to need space research even more than we do now?

Re:Patent?

[bravehamster]

And I understand that research costs money, but maybe we as a society would be better off if governments not spend so much on space when there are so many worthwhile medical research programs that arin dire need of funding.

You assume that just because the space program would stop recieving funds, medical research would start recieving more. Not only that, but this seems to me to be incredibly short-sighted thinking. What happens if we cut off all funding to space and concentrate on medical advances? Everyone starts living longer, the planet becomes overcrowded very quickly, at which point we would wish we had spent more on space research. Space research is humanitys only chance for long-term survival. Our top priority should be expanding beyond this vulnerable little planet before we get wiped out or wipe ourselves out.

Re:Patent?

[ArsonSmith]

>I just hope that the patent holders do not charge and arm and a leg

hahaha charge an arm and a leg. charge me an arm and a leg to grow a new arm and leg???

sorry that was funny I couldn't help it.

Re:Patent?

[analog_line]

Excuse me, but what the hell do you mean by "so much in space"? Have you looked at NASA's budget recently (as probablythe best funded space angecy in the world)? It's pathetic. The government spends MUCH more than NASA's budget on medical research already. Please find a clue somewhere.

Re:Patent?

[linzeal]

It was overpopulation in the cities of europe as much as religious freedom that caused the great colonization of the americas. It will take a similar overpopulation here to start a space colonization push.

Re:Patent?

[the_quark]

May I point out that if medical science gets much better, we're going to need space research even more than we do now?

This is a common fallacy. No space-based expatration system is going to ship enough people off this planet to make the slightest bit of difference. There are 250,000 new people on this planet, ever single day. That is net of deaths, by the way. You'd have to be able to ship a quarter of a million people off this planet every single day (that's more than the population of New York City every year, by the way) just to keep population growth flat!

Space-based colonization is probably important to the long-term health of the species. And we need places to grow other than here. But the babies need to be born there, not here if space is going to be part of the solution.

Re:Patent?

[MsWillow]

I just hope that the patent holders do not charge and arm and a leg for the world to use it.

So what if they do? First thing you do is grow an extra arm and leg, to pay their fee, and from there, you're home free.

Now, just what these guys will do with all these spare arms and legs, I shudder to guess. Maybe they're planning a new arms race? Or they just want to eercise their 2nd Amendment right to keep (and bear) arms?

Re:Patent?

[mESSDan]

I just hope that the patent holders do not charge and arm and a leg for the world to use it.

Relax, if they did, you could just fly to Brazil to have it done. ;)

Re:Patent?

[SlashDread]

"This is a common fallacy. No space-based expatration system is going to ship enough people off this planet to make the slightest bit of difference. There are 250,000 new people on this planet, ever single day."

IMHO Space is THE survivor enviroment for HUMANKIND. No its not gonna house every new baby born, but it doesnt need to.

I just like to know we have a backup solution in case we have a harddisk crash. Like a nuke terrorist attack or something.

Gr /Dread

Re:more killings?

[Mr_Matt]

When will the Christians of the world wake up and realize that their "moral standards" are seriously fucked up?

w00t *bling* *bling* w00t

Flamebait alert! Flamebait alert!

Feeding a troll, feh, howzabout becoming a troll! Seriously, exactly what do you expect out of a discussion with that phrase...constructive dialog? Man, I wish I had mod points...

One moral issue down, two to go.

[eAndroid]

Forgive me for pointing out the obvious but this is good for several reasons. The one I'm most pleased with is the moral aspect. Assuming this is true we no longer need to farm embryonic humans for stem cells. We can gather them (and possibly in a superior form) from consenting adults.

This may also help compatibility. If there were any problems with a replacement organ for example then this would possibly lessen the chances of rejection.

Of course this still leaves moral controversy over what is done with these stem cells - I mean, that whole human cloning thing.

Re:One moral issue down, two to go.

[Mr. Neutron]

Of course this still leaves moral controversy over what is done with these stem cells - I mean, that whole human cloning thing.

IF human reproductive cloning doesn't involve the destruction of human life, and IF human cloning is safe (no great chance of abnormalities), what's the problem then?

Anyway, the ability to farm perfectly good tissues and organs out of our own cells would be such a boon to medicine that I can't really see the possibility that it could also be used for reproductive cloning as being that big of a deal.

Re:One moral issue down, two to go.

[eAndroid]

Ya damn, thought I would have given it up when I hit 50. Oh well, not like I care.

As long as talentless trolls like you are around there'll always be room for talentless karma whores like me.

And just for that, I'm +1ing myself. Ha-ha.

Re:One moral issue down, two to go.

[Computer!]

[...]what's the problem then?

El Santo Padre

This is very good news...

[(H)elix1]

One of the exiting possibilities stem cell research is someday we may be able to make better replacement organs without horking the immune system, understand aging (and someday doing something about it), or any of the pure research that a baseline cell could offer.. It is still way out there, but this nicely side steps most of the religious/ethical/what about the children political nonsense we have with the embryo-based stem cells. Woot! Just getting past the BS is worth a noble prize in my eyes...

Re:This is very good news...

[drodver]

If by "doing something about" aging you mean helping people be healthy and active until they die at a reasonable age then great. If you mean keeping people alive significantly longer then that's a whole new can of worms. It'd be great in the long run if we can handle the overpopulation this would speed up.

Re:This is very good news...

[TheSync]

One of the exiting possibilities stem cell research is someday we may be able to make better replacement organs without horking the immune system

For instance, my wife has gastroparesis, a "brain damage" of the nerves in the stomach. She could use a new stomach, but it would be crazy to do a stomach transplant now because of the risk of rejection and immune-supressing drugs. These cells could provide the progenitors required to create a new stomach.

Re:This is very good news...

[ghjm]

This would not cause a significant overpopulation problem. We can assume that these treatments will not be available to the poor, so any population increase would be among the rich. The rich do not reproduce at a rate capable of sustaining their numbers. So the result would be a higher rate of increase in the rich population, perhaps not sufficient to offset the decrease already taking place.

Having a limited time-span within which wealth can be accumulated is one of the few limits on the ability of the rich to get richer while the poor get poorer. This technology removes that limit, thereby contributing to economic inequity. Inequity is widely believed to be a root cause of political and military instability.

So, long-term, widespread extreme longevity at high cost would result in an even more comfortable existence for Americans and Western Europeans, accompanied by a commensurate increase in September 11 type incidents.

This is already the path we find ourselves on. Move along, nothing to see here.

The social implications are sweet...

[Rev.LoveJoy]

As this gives the close minded folks who lean towards "religion" as a reason to stop cloning research just one less pilliar to stand upon (ergo: you don't need "dead babies" to study stem cells anymore)

With respect to the aging claim made, is two years enough time to detect a reasonal shorting of the chromatic telomerase?

Cheers,
-- RLJ

Re:The social implications are sweet...

[Reality Master 101]

Yeah, it's pretty closed minded to not want to experiment on human embryos (AKA pre-born babies).

And by the way, religion is irrelevent to the issue (on BOTH sides).

Re:The social implications are sweet...

[Tackhead]

> With respect to the aging claim made, is two years enough time to detect a reasonal shorting of the chromatic telomerase?

More to the point, who cares? If I'm 45, and have 20 years' worth of use in my current cells, I can just have a bunch frozen and new organs grown from the frozen batch whenever my new parts wear out.

So what if my replacement tires are only warranted for 20,000 miles instead of the original manufacturer's 100,000 miles? I'll just grow another set after every fourth oil change.

Re:The social implications are sweet...

[junkgrep]

While I would agree that one can be on either side of the debate no matter what their religious convictions or lack thereof are, I wouldn't say that religion is, in practice, entirely irrelevant. One of the strongest arguments (indeed, the only real argument I can see) against killing embryos is that they have a tiny soul inside. While I don't believe this, many people do, and it forms the core of their convictions. Most people have no interest in the esoteric word games that the atheistic arguments against the research require.

---Yeah, it's pretty closed minded to not want to experiment on human embryos (AKA pre-born babies).---

What's so special about JUST being human, per se? A human embryo is even less aware and has less capacities in any sense, than a brine shrimp, which most people feel no compunction about killing for completely trivial reasons. Why is the fact that it is "human" genetically particularly important far BEFORE it has developed into a being with capacities far beyond any animal? We might as well argue that a computer disk with my genetic code on it is a living being that deserves human rights.

Interesting

[Ooblek]

This could put a whole new twist on toys in the genre of Sea Monkeys and Chia pets. Can I grow my boss or my professor in a petri dish and then torture them without any legal ramifications?

Re:Interesting

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh man, as if I don't already get enough "Penis Enlargement" emails.

Finally!

[Noodlenose]

..and about time.

Everybody involved in healthcare will breathe a sigh of relief about this discovery. As there are less and less people willing to donate organs, it is time that we get other means of harvesting organs.

D

Re:Finally!

[Anonymous Coward]

yeah--and you don't have to kill a baby in order to get it. I bet the crosstians will still have a problem with it.

Re:Finally!

[PaganRitual]

I can have a second penis. Thank you science!

yeah, thats all well and good, but does that mean you are gonna have to grow a third arm in order to still be able to operate the keyboard at the same time ... hehehe

Re:Finally!

[Alsee]

I can have a second penis.

What the heck do you want a second penis for?
Give me a vagina and I'd never have to leave the house!

Uhhhhh, wait a miniute... I don't leave the house now.

-

Re:more killings?

[caferace]

...Or am I also feeding a troll, here?

The perfect new meme: Please don't clone the trolls..

Re:more killings?

[Anonymous Coward]

When will the Christians of the world wake up and realize that their "moral standards" are seriously fucked up?

I wish you were an aborted baby used for stem cell research... maybe then you'd realize how "f*cked up" out "moral standards" are...

Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness... unless we need your body for science, then you're just f*cked without any say in the matter.

Ban this research

[Sprunkys]

Oh my goodness, but wouldn't this mean that potentially we might be able to create a new human being out of those MAPCs.
Quick, ban this research, it is heresy, it is aweful, it can save lifes!

Patent Granted

[heretic108]

REUTERS, MARCH 5 The University of Minnesota has been granted a patent for what it calls 'The Ultimate [human] Stem Cell'.

It is now illegal for humans to generate this cell, or invoke its capabilities to develop into any human tissue, without a license from the University of Minnesota.

Expectant mothers and fathers, upon confirmation of pregnancy, will be asked to sign a Universal Stem Cell End User License Agreement, and pay an annual license fee.

Healing of disease, and repair of damaged body tissues, will incur special levies.

Any use of Universal Stem Cells in any bodily function will result in substantial fines, possible jail terms, and compulsory MRI scans and biopsies for the forced removal of offending cells from the bodies of perpetrators.

You have been warned!

Re:Patent Granted

[Dyolf Knip]

Cute. The USPTO would probably wonder what was so funny about it, though.

With any luck, they'll just patent the process of filtering the stem cells out (or of creating them, if they can figure out what is is they did) and be very generous with the licensing.

Re:more killings?

[pclminion]

And I thought I'd be bad at trolling.

For a first shot, not too bad, eh?

As for my statement about fucked up standards, I believe I'm entitled to express that opinion. It might do some good to read "Why I Am Not A Christian," a collection of essays by Bertrand Russell. You don't have to agree with it -- but why not read it?

Link to the researcher

[Beryllium Sphere(tm)]

http://www.micab.umn.edu/faculty/Verfaillie.html

and an abstract of one stem cell paper is at
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cm d= Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=11458512&dopt=Abstrac t

"selection process [may actually create] the MAPCs

[Cy Guy]

"others think the selection process actually creates the MAPCs.

I don't think there is 'a cell' that is lurking there that can do this. I think that Catherine has found a way to produce a cell that can behave this way," says Neil Theise of New York University Medical School.

If this turns out to be the case rather than the cell naturally occurring in bone marrow, it has tremendous implications from a patent perspective. Since you cannot patent a naturally occuring object, anyone who could reverse engineer the selection process would be able to produce these cells. But if it is the process itself that transforms otherwise non stem-cell behaving cells into MAPC's then process itself would be patentable and I believe even if you reverse engineered it you would be expected pay royalties. Since claims like "cell lines have been growing for almost two years . . .with no signs of ageing" could herald this find as biomedical fountain of youth, the raoyalties could be astronomical, especially when used for non-life-threatening conditions.

WOW, who would have thought that the fountain of youth, and a source of infinite free power would be announced on the same day?

Patented me????

[3seas]

I claim Prior art!

Re:more killings?

[Anonymous Coward]

are you going to start killing adults now too?

If you are suggesting (and truly believe) that removing some cells from your body is the equivalent of murder, I have to think you have no knowledge of the subject whatsoever. You should probably do some research and then come back to post.

Stem cells are simply undifferentiated cells that can give rise to many different cell types under the right conditions. If the possibility of killing cells goes against your religion/morals, you should probably stop brushing your teeth as this kills millions of epithelial cells in your mouth that otherwise could have lived a long and prosperous (although stinky) life had you never brushed.

For Those That Have Been Slashdotted We Salute You

[Peridriga]

A stem cell has been found in adults that can turn into every single tissue in the body. It might turn out to be the most important cell ever discovered.

Until now, only stem cells from early embryos were thought to have such properties. If the finding is confirmed, it will mean cells from your own body could one day be turned into all sorts of perfectly matched replacement tissues and even organs.

If so, there would be no need to resort to therapeutic cloning - cloning people to get matching stem cells from the resulting embryos. Nor would you have to genetically engineer embryonic stem cells (ESCs) to create a "one cell fits all" line that does not trigger immune rejection. The discovery of such versatile adult stem cells will also fan the debate about whether embryonic stem cell research is justified.

"The work is very exciting," says Ihor Lemischka of Princeton University. "They can differentiate into pretty much everything that an embryonic stem cell can differentiate into."

Remarkable findings

The cells were found in the bone marrow of adults by Catherine Verfaillie at the University of Minnesota. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof, and though the team has so far published little, a patent application seen by New Scientist shows the team has carried out extensive experiments.

These confirm that the cells - dubbed multipotent adult progenitor cells, or MAPCs - have the same potential as ESCs. "It's very dramatic, the kinds of observations [Verfaillie] is reporting," says Irving Weissman of Stanford University. "The findings, if reproducible, are remarkable."

At least two other labs claim to have found similar cells in mice, and one biotech company, MorphoGen Pharmaceuticals of San Diego, says it has found them in skin and muscle as well as human bone marrow. But Verfaillie's team appears to be the first to carry out the key experiments needed to back up the claim that these adult stem cells are as versatile as ESCs.

Verfaillie extracted the MAPCs from the bone marrow of mice, rats and humans in a series of stages. Cells that do not carry certain surface markers, or do not grow under certain conditions, are gradually eliminated, leaving a population rich in MAPCs. Verfaillie says her lab has reliably isolated the cells from about 70 per cent of the 100 or so human volunteers who donated marrow samples.

Indefinite growth

The cells seem to grow indefinitely in culture, like ESCs. Some cell lines have been growing for almost two years and have kept their characteristics, with no signs of ageing, she says.

Given the right conditions, MAPCs can turn into a myriad of tissue types: muscle, cartilage, bone, liver and different types of neurons and brain cells. Crucially, using a technique called retroviral marking, Verfaillie has shown that the descendants of a single cell can turn into all these different cell types - a key experiment in proving that MAPCs are truly versatile.

Also, Verfaillie's group has done the tests that are perhaps the gold standard in assessing a cell's plasticity. She placed single MAPCs from humans and mice into very early mouse embryos, when they are just a ball of cells. Analyses of mice born after the experiment reveal that a single MAPC can contribute to all the body's tissues.

MAPCs have many of the properties of ESCs, but they are not identical. Unlike ESCs, for example, they do not seem to form cancerous masses if you inject them into adults. This would obviously be highly desirable if confirmed. "The data looks very good, it's very hard to find any flaws," says Lemischka. But it still has to be independently confirmed by other groups, he adds.

Fundamental questions

Meanwhile, there are some fundamental questions that must be answered, experts say. One is whether MAPCs really form functioning cells.

Stem cells that differentiate may express markers characteristic of many different cell types, says Freda Miller of McGill University. But simply detecting markers for, say, neural tissue does not prove that a stem cell really has become a working neuron.

Verfaillie's findings also raise questions about the nature of stem cells. Her team thinks that MAPCs are rare cells present in the bone marrow that can be fished out through a series of enriching steps. But others think the selection process actually creates the MAPCs.

"I don't think there is 'a cell' that is lurking there that can do this. I think that Catherine has found a way to produce a cell that can behave this way," says Neil Theise of New York University Medical School.

19:00 23 January 02

Tough luck!

[2Bits]

From the article:

The cells were found in the bone marrow of adults by Catherine Verfaillie at the University of Minnesota. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof, and though the team has so far published little, a patent application seen by New Scientist shows the team has carried out extensive experiments.

Tough luck. It is already being patented.

Re:Tough luck!

[systemBuilder]

This is not too surprising. We all know that body cells have a "fixed" life, e.g. divide something like 200 times, stop dividing, and die off 50 years later.

However, the one really variable thing in a person is the amount of blood that they lose. In women, blood is converted to mother's milk, so you might expect that mothers of 20 children or more would die young ... but they probably do not.

In men who fight wars, it's easy to lose gallons upon gallons of blood. Where do all those red blood cells come from ?? From the bone marrow.

For nearly all types of injuries, blood (and sometimes muscle) morphs into scar tissue. So whenever you break a limb, you lose quite a bit of blood even if there is no visible bruising. In fact, in this respect blood seems to behave a lot like stem cells.

If I had been looking for a source of stem cells - cells that can differentiate into almost any other type of cells, the bone marrow would be the first place i'd look. In fact, I'd be really surprised if there WEREN'T stem cells in the bone marrow.

We recently had children and had their stem cells (from cord blood) stored. What's the primary purpose of doing this ?? Bone marrow transplants !!!

Forever young?

[OuD]

So if this works, will we be able to grow both internal and external body parts which we can use to replace our own?

If they somehow figure out how to repair brain damage due to old age with these cells, wouldn't that mean people could theoretically live forever?

I doubt it would be as easy as to just insert them into the brain and let it assimilate them, but still an interesting thought..

Re:Forever young?

[Tattva]

If they somehow figure out how to repair brain damage due to old age with these cells, wouldn't that mean people could theoretically live forever?

Calm down there, brother. In order to live forever, your vascular system, your organs, your immune system, your gastrointestinal system, and your nervous system must function properly. Even if they invent a way to replace all of these with fresh cells grown outside the body from time to time, it would be quite expensive to replace all of these items via surgery. Every third person in the US would have to be a doctor in order to meet the demand. (exaggeration?)

Growing the cells isn't the hard part, migrating them to the proper place in the body is the hard part. Think about your teeth: they grow at a specific point in your life and then start their gradual decay, there are a bunch of them, and surgery to insert 20-30 new ones into your jaw would take days. The problem is the body is designed for a distinct growth phase, and after that phase, certain tissues and structures are naturally incapable of spontaneous regeneration.

I think it would be some time before we move beyond figuring out how to duplicate the growth phase in a jar and duplicate it in the body, where we would presumably only want certain tissues to grow, etc. In the short to medium term, medicine's ability to keep you alive will be significantly increased, but you will be an old person with new parts, not a perpetually young person.

I bet skin and associated connective tissue should be relatively easy to replace, though, so you'll see a lot of actors in their 80's emulating young folks, just don't expect them to be able to do their own stunts.

Re:Forever young?

[alkaloid]

So if this works, will we be able to grow both internal and external body parts which we can use to replace our own?

Ummm...can they manipulate those external organs to, say, increase length or performance?

Re:Forever young?

[OuD]

I bet skin and associated connective tissue should be relatively easy to replace, though, so you'll see a lot of actors in their 80's emulating young folks, just don't expect them to be able to do their own stunts.

Ugh.. That means we'll be seeing Harrison Ford in "Indiana Jones 12: Quest for the Holy Stem Cells" (minus the stunts) in thirty years.

Re:Forever young?

[Wonda]

Only if you are really, really careful, I remember reading an article that said people would live (on average) for about 650 years if there were no diseases or aging at all, because people would die in accidents (if they don't change the way they drive etc).

Still... much better than the less than 100 years we have now.

PS no i don't have a reference for this, it's been years since i read it.

Wow... big suprise.

[Anonymous Coward]

I could've guessed that this entire topic would just lead to a gigantic flamewar.

Re:more killings?

[jsprat]

Current methods of obtaining stem cells from live bone marrow involve high doses of chemotherapy (even if you're not sick, you soon will be) to kill most of the red and white blood cells. When your marrow kicks into overdrive to balance things out, some of the stem cells that haven't differentiated into white or red blood cells spill into the blood stream.

These are the cells used for stem cell transplants for cancer patients.

Premature (Cold fusion?)

[kenneth_martens]

If this turns out to be true, it would be a remarkable find. But as the article points out, this is only a preliminary report, and "the team has so far published little." They will need to carry out extensive tests and publish a lot more research before anything conclusive can be determined.

It is interesting, but I wish researchers wouldn't jump the gun and announce "findings" before research is complete. (Cold fusion, anyone?)

Re:Premature (Cold fusion?)

[Anonymous Coward]

I work at the U of MN and know a little bit about this project - although I do not have any personal connection to Dr. Verfaillie's lab. There are (from what I can tell) two reasons that they have published little: (1) the team wants to be dambed sure they have dotted all the i's and crossed all the t's and (2) they have been working their tails off and have been too busy doing the science to take the considerable amount of time it will take to publish. Keep an eye out - papers from this group will be published in all the major journals eventually and it will someday be mentioned in even the popular media (albeit simplified to the point of missing all the interesting details and wedged between stories about OJ's ex-GF and the "American Taliban" guy). This article is also not surprising - these findings have been well-known (although not widely reproduced or reported yet) in the scientific community for some time now. And it should be noted that this group is not calling press conferences and announcing their findings - occasionally some member of the media stumbles upon a project like this and tries to turn it into a "scoop" before the story is completely mature.

Re:more killings?

[Anonymous Coward]

When will the Christians of the world wake up and realize that their "moral standards" are seriously fucked up?

Thanks for lumping in the beliefs of all the Christians in the world with one troll's obvious flamebait.

No, seriously. Thanks. All of us *really* are connected to the same Pat Robertson-groupmind.

Moral clarity

[DaoudaW]

The article is kinda breathy, especially for New Scientist - but

I hate to disillusion you, but New Scientist is well-known for their sensationalism. If this were Nature, Science, or even Scientific American, Hemo's comment would make sense. Don't take me wrong I've enjoyed reading New Scientist for a number of years, but its niche is tabloid-style, scientific journalism. It is not a scientific journal.

If this research is valid, it is a huge breakthrough. But it means that human cloning will have to be argued for its own sake, rather than it somehow being necessary for growing spare kidneys. My concern with this is that Bush, et al, will use it to shut down cloning research altogether; they've never seemed to have any other use for cloning. On the other hand, it may allow clarity on the morality of cloning.

Re:Moral clarity

[Anonymous Coward]

Tabloid style scientific journalism?

Stephen Hawkin's New Diet: Eat what you want, still lost weight!

Was Albert Einstein actually Monica's Father?

New evidence discovered on Io that clears OJ Simpson!

Re:Moral clarity

[Mr_Matt]

Exactly...I wonder if Hemos didn't mean to say

The artice is kinda breathy, even for New Scientist

:)

If this research is valid, it is a huge breakthrough. But it means that human cloning will have to be argued for its own sake, rather than it somehow being necessary for growing spare kidneys. My concern with this is that Bush, et al, will use it to shut down cloning research altogether; they've never seemed to have any other use for cloning. On the other hand, it may allow clarity on the morality of cloning.

And this is a great point...it seems like the reason cloning research has been allowed to go forward is because of the potential gains resulting from non-fully cloned results. The bigger question, I think, is this: how does this modify the age-old dispute between unfettered scientific research and constant restraints on that research by people with non-scientific agendas to push? Can this breakthrough provide a clear method to delineate "good" cloning research from "bad" cloning research?

Re:Moral clarity

[Jagasian]

Oh come on. Cloning is just another form of conception. I still remember when test tube babies as a form of conception was considered immoral.

Re:Moral clarity

[Mr_Matt]

Oh come on. Cloning is just another form of conception. I still remember when test tube babies as a form of conception was considered immoral.

To you (and me) maybe, but there are people out there who find any form of non-natural conception to be immoral. As a proto-scientist myself, I feel like it's my duty, at least to some degree, to respect the moral imperatives of those who would fund my research. Granted, that kind of direction can go too far and lead to silliness, but in the case of cloning, there are some ethical and moral issues that need to be resolved before wholescale cloning research can be started, using federal/state funds.

I'm playing devil's advocate here, so keep the flamage down, but here's an argument about cloning that gave me pause: the cloning of a human being would be one of the most phenominal scientific experiments of all time. This is an experiment, performed to create a living human being, that takes place without the consent of the subject. Sure, that person doesn't exist at the start of the experiment, but at the end of it, they know that their entire existence is due wholly to research that they had no directing part in. That's a tough call to make, playing God like that. Other issues, like civil rights for cloned humans (seems trivial, but there are those who think that their clones become their slaves...STW if you don't believe me), identification issues between clones/progenitors (what happens if the clone/parent commits a crime and blames it on the parent/clone?) and other sticky issues still exist...these are things that we should work out before moving ahead at full speed.

The research is valuable, but the end results need better direction, IMNSHO. :)

Re:Moral clarity

[Amoeba Protozoa]

Although I believe that the New Scientist is very often sensationalistic, why not contact the named scientist at the U of MN?

Here is her contact information.

-AP

Re:Moral clarity

[payslee]

This is an experiment, performed to create a living human being, that takes place without the consent of the subject. Sure, that person doesn't exist at the start of the experiment, but at the end of it, they know that their entire existence is due wholly to research that they had no directing part in. That's a tough call to make, playing God like that.

How is this different than any other instance of becoming a parent? Surely the words "Well, I didn't ask to be born!" ring a bell for for most people who have, or were, teenagers?

Re:Moral clarity

[Mr_Matt]

How is this different than any other instance of becoming a parent?

Another great question - recall the part where I stated "devil's advocate", yadda yadda. :) Having said that, for the natural conception people, there would be a difference - the natural child being born would have been produced, albeit against its will, through natural means. Being produced artificially against someone's will, with no known knowledge of the outcome of said experiment, seems like a step too far for some. Or so the argument goes... :)

Immortality in our lifetime?

[Steveftoth]

Yet more evidence that we will have the ability to make ourselfs immortal in this lifetime. Well, at least the rich will be able to live forever. This is the kind of research I would be investing in if I had more then pocket change.

Thanks Hemos

[ImaLamer]

[note: bitchslap comming]

but if this is true, which needs to be studied more,

Needs to be studied more? Of course it does. Who ever said they weren't going to?

Thank you for the wonderful insight. If it's true there will be more research than, well, you can shake a chromosome at. If it's false... who cares?

And now for another.. Southpark Moment

[WndrBr3d]

"Yes, I only need a few more aborted fetus' and my stem cells would have cloned me my own Shakeys Pizza !"

Re:more killings?

[Mr_Matt]

As for my statement about fucked up standards, I believe I'm entitled to express that opinion.

When did I state otherwise? You could trot around spouting Nazi propaganda, Knicks scores, summaries of the stock market, or simply chant "poopy poopy look at the troll!" and you'd be entitled to do it. I believe I asked what you thought you'd get out of it...but I guess all you wanted was the childish rush of being a troll. Well, congratulations, I bit twice, but no more. All I'll ask you is this: for someone who earned a +1 bonus, please act like it, okay?

It might do some good to read "Why I Am Not A Christian," a collection of essays by Bertrand Russell. You don't have to agree with it -- but why not read it?

Because it's not the fucking topic, that's why. Besides, I have read several of those essays. And frankly, ol' Bertie smacks more of self-indulgent wankiness than of logic and reason. But I won't debate it anymore with you. Frankly, I hope they bitchslap this thread before it gets out of hand. I'll take the karma hit.

FOAD, troll.

And who you can thank...

[Reality Master 101]

<controversial opinion>Thank the pro-life contingent for this. Yes, them. Because of the hard-line stance of many people that human life shouldn't be devalued through experimentation, there is naturally going to be a lot more research into finding adult cells that do not have the controversy attached.

Sometimes sticking to principles and not taking the easy ways out (e.g., manufacturing embryoes for experimentation) leads to very nice results.

</controversial opinion>

Re:And who you can thank...

[Anonymous Coward]

What is really heartening here is that because of this research, any person can receive an exact genetic match for themselves. It is their marrow they'd use.

Also, bone marrow is delicious, but I mentioned that earlier and got modded down for it. :-(

Re:And who you can thank...

[Gailin]

DISCLAIMER: Please do not take this as an attack :-)

Very interesting opinion. I can definitely see where given recent media events this opinion could be formed.

Question: Can you point to one source that indicates the research is a direct result of pro-lifers?

Just because a lot of the attention has been on controversial research as of late. This in no way indicates that concurrent research was the direct result of this attention or moral disagreements.

Note: After further review I have found one supporter who specifically supports ethical research here

But in an article, located here, it is stated, "Even though Verfaillie is a leading research in adult stem cells, she steadfastly believes the government should also fund research on embryonic research". So even though a few supporters may have altruistic goals, this does not necessarily mean the research is founded on the same principles.

Re:And who you can thank...

[Anonymous Coward]

Because of the hard-line
stance of many people that human life shouldn't be devalued through experimentation, there is naturally
going to be a lot more research into finding adult cells that do not have the controversy attached

That's not really the only reason, though. Even if you could collect the embryos from every really early-term abortion performed, you still don't end up with many cells. Granted, they expand well. Adults are a much better source for stem cells (if they exist in adults) for a number of reasons. Perhaps most important is that it implies you can get syngenic cells with which to do replacement therapies. No risk of rejection. No laborious tissue-matching process-just pull the ASC from the patient, do what you want with them, and put them back in.

Re:more killings?

[Anonymous Coward]

Groupmind? I thought that was the definition of religion. How can you simultaneously be for the use of aborted fetus stem cells, and consider yourself Christian, when nearly every Christian leader in the world has denounced the practice?

Now that pigs are obsolete...

[ebbomega]

'Tis sweet... but there's a big problem I could forsee (dunno if the article addressed this... I kinda jumped through it...)...

If we went and did testing on this with humans, how would we be sure to inhibit the reproduction of said tissue? I'm just wondering if these tissues would reproduce the same way that embryos would.

If it did, then it's quite possible that we could eventually replace _all_ the organs in the body (With pretty much the exception of the brain) and thusly we now have a theoretical "fountain of youth" (Any bio nuts wanna call me on this one? I'm not certain how plausible this would be... haven't taken biology in years...). If it doesn't, how can we be certain that growth inhibition wouldn't be lost somewhere in here, and thusly this kind of transplant would end up giving us happy little tumors? Especially if you're transplanting something like a heart, it'd be a Bad Thing to have your heart itself turn into a gigantic tumor...

(Excuse the amateur biologist in me... I'm just wondering...)

Re:Now that pigs are obsolete...

[mOdQuArK!]

(With pretty much the exception of the brain)

Dunno - if you can't fix up the brain too, then fixing up everything else is going to have limited benefit.

I suspect that although you can't replace the whole brain, if you can squirt some stem cells into it in various places to replace anything that's shutting down or dying, you could probably keep it going. A little too many stem cells, or over too long a period of time, will probably cause you to lose old memories (as the stem cells make new connections which will interfere with the current network configuration).

On the other hand, if you can get enough stem cells to restore the flexibility of intellect that you had as a child, then you could really improve your skill set (learn languages w/o accent, ingrain martial arts skills, other stuff that you have to start young to learn completely).

End of debate

[$pacemold]

MAPCs have many of the properties of ESCs, but they are not identical. Unlike ESCs, for example, they do not seem to form cancerous masses if you inject them into adults.

If this is true, it makes MAPCs much better for organ cloning than ESCs: no immune reaction, less risk of cancer, an no ethical problems.

Bad Interpretation

[virg_mattes]

They're applying for a patent on the extraction and enrichment process, not the cells themselves, folks. Stem cells can't be patented, because the host person could simply claim prior use and blow the patent.

Virg

Re:Bad Interpretation

[bedel]

hmm carefull saying this! some Embreyo might claim prior art and blow a person

So let me see if i understand this...

[Anonymous Coward]

If I put a bunch of these stem cells next to a Shaky's Pizza, would they work together to build another Shaky's Pizza?

That'd be sweet!

*cough*

[ebbomega]

"I just hope that the patent holders do not charge and arm and a leg for the world to use it"

Feel free to Mod me down for this, but I think this is got to be the worst Pun I've ever heard...

ageless cells - old news:

[ImaLamer]

http://www.nature.com/nsu/990114/990114-6.html

Re:ageless cells - old news:

[Anonymous Coward]

That article just talks about theoretical properties and implications of a generic ageless cell. This current slashdot topic is about cells that EXIST and MAY ACTUALLY have ageless properties. Actual vs. Theoretical - Do you know the difference?

Stop acting like some know-it-all and declaring that this is "old news" when it's not. Your nick fits you well; you are definitely a lamer you jackass!

Hey, I'm a Christian. I'm not sleeping

[dnoyeb]

I'm a Christian. First you get the stem cell. Then you clone them. Then you grow new people and harvest their organs for yourself. Its all beginning to come together!

Re:"selection process [may actually create] the MA

[Tackhead]

> WOW, who would have thought that the fountain of youth, and a source of infinite free power [cnn.com] would be announced on the same day?

Fountain of youth, free power, AOL buying Red Hat, Amazon making a profit. It's been a banner week for insanity ;-)

Note that the "free power" thing on CNN was bullshit. Some scientifically-illiterate Reuters boob (but I repeat myself) was impressed that the voltage measured across the terminals of a set of batteries was 48.9V at load, and 51.2V not under load, "indicating that, somehow, they had been reimbursed." The inventor told the boob that three 100W light bulbs powered for 10 minutes (and his magical device) drew 4.5 kilowatts from the batteries. And the boob, sorry, journalism major, bought it - hook, line, sinker, and copy of Angling Times.

Next thing you know, someone will apply for a Nobel Prize because of the momentous discovery that his "dead" flashlight "works" for a few seconds after being turned off for a few minutes.

Re:more killings?

[Anonymous Coward]

Groupmind? I thought that was the definition of religion.

Martin Luther didn't think so. He disagreed with every religious leader of his day, to the point that he was hunted by the Catholic church.

Being Christian implies accepting a core set of scriptural beliefs, not agreeing with every chump who decides he's a religious expert.

Moral Quandry

[syphax]

Now what am I supposed to do with my clone?

Re:Moral Quandry

[serps]

Here's a suggestion :)

Let them charge whatever they wish

[jamesmartinluther]

I truly hope that the inventors charge whatever they can get away with and perhaps even regulate the use of this process for as long as the patent is in effect. If a university or government arm sponsored the project, then I hope that they do the same.

After all, shouldn't the inventor have at least a temporary say in what is done with their patented invention? Say, 14 years?

We should not sit back in the armchair hoping that the result of their hard work will benefit us on our own terms. Be happy that this team of researchers has done such great work and that we may have an opportunity share in its benefits.

Sorry, not on the list...

[gdyas]

So very sorry, but these revolutionary new master stem cells aren't going to be permitted for scientific or medical use. You see, they're not on the list of 30 Bush drew up last year. So, no go. Flush 'em. His Chimpness has spoken.

Re:Sorry, not on the list...

[compupc1]

Well, I hate to point out the obvious (and maybe I'm just faling for a troll here), but: 1) We don't even know if this will work out in the way we all want 2) Bush's list was for embryonic stem cells. Do you really think anybody would be dumb enough to claim that these cells should be limited by that decision too? The only moral implications with Adult stem cells is what might happen if the technology progressed to the point where it could create a new social rift.

Re:"selection process [may actually create] the MA

[Anonymous Coward]

If you have a source of infinate power then you better have an infinate sink for that power.

Adult Stem Cells

[flogger]

Wow! Adult Stem Cells. This isn't new. Adults have always had stem cells AND this has been known. The National Institute of Health has an article [nih.gov] from May 2000 which states,
While stem cells are extraordinarily important in early human development, multipotent stem cells are also found in children and adults.
Again, this is not a new discovery. ~flogger

Considerations, Offtopically

[virg_mattes]

First off, if the pun was intentional, very good work. Second, the work would be in the public domain. They're trying to patent their extraction and enrichment process, not the research itself. Third, your logic about cutting off funding for one type of science to push it to another has two main flaws:

1.) Reducing funding for space does not necessarily translate to extending funding for medical research.
2.) What if the next big medical discovery happens in the space program? There are so many examples of this that I could go on for days, but in the "pure" sciences (as opposed to applied sciences) very often discoveries are made from which the benefit is not readily apparent, but it soon becomes something that changes the world. Perhaps the cure for cancer comes from experiments done with materials in zero-G or vacuum environments. There's no way to know, so artificially limiting venues of research because they don't have obvious connections to a particular cause is very short-sighted.

Virg

Re:more killings?

[Anonymous Coward]

Being Christian implies accepting a core set of scriptural beliefs, not agreeing with every chump who decides he's a religious expert.

And doesn't that core set of beliefs contain things like: stoning others to death, banishment to eternal, burning hell, dehumanization of those who do not believe, and the belief that you can do just about anything you damn well feel like, and if you only ask forgiveness, you'll be saved from all the horrors that the non-believers will undergo?

You can't just mix-and-match which passages from scripture you agree with, and those you disagree with, and rightfully call yourself an upkeeper of the faith.

What kind of system of morals accepts sin as natural and unavoidable, forgiveable even in extreme cases, and yet sends the best of people off to hell simply because they don't believe that a man who lived 2000 years ago was the son of God? If you ever get to Hell, please shake Gandhi's hand for me.

This is GOOD NEWS

[mcrbids]

One of my sons has type 1 diabetes, heretofore an incurable disease. We have to test his blood at least 3-4 times per day, and continuously administer injections. It's a hassle, it's expensive, and despite our best efforts we know that the inevitable swings of blood sugar can shorten his life, and lead to severe health complications.

There IS a cure for type 1 diabetes - recently in Edmonton, CA they "cured" about a dozen people by injecting islet cells (those that produce insulin) into the liver, along with some mild anti-immune drugs.

The anti-immune drugs are needed because the islet cells implanted are foreign.

The problem is that there aren't enough extractable islet cells in all viable cadavers in this country to cure even 1% of the diabetic population.

Under our current conservative presidency, stem-cell research involving embryos is at a near stand-still. (Only existing lines can be used, new ones cannot be created)

But if these stem cells can be trained to behave as islet cells, then my 13 year old son may well be effectively cured before he turns 20.

This is good news!

Re:This is GOOD NEWS

[Anonymous Coward]

You should make your son eat a shitload of yougurt. Yogurt for breakfast, and lunch at the very least. It really helps lower blood sugar. Yogurt is a wunderdrug. It also helps bad breath and heart disease and every other aliment. You cannot go wrong with yogurt.

This post brought to you by America's dairy farmers.

Re:This is GOOD NEWS

[DaEvOsH]

Sorry about the reactions of this ACs, it shows their maturity and probable, their (mental) age. I hope you son keeps up, it must be really hard. Been in face of personal problems lately and learnt than next to health, most problems are nothing.

Best luck, honestly. It makes me mad to know all the drugs that dont go into market fast enough because of testing and legal hassles, and many people meanwhile are dying. But this is needed, to keep drugs from killing or hurting. What drives me mad is politics and religion(W, any one?) getting in the way of medicine...

Re:This is GOOD NEWS

[Anonymous Coward]

Anything is OK in the name of "saving lives"! No one should ever die of anything! Screw the consequences of science as long as little Billy is ok.

The Ultimate Stem Cell!

[Isldeur]

It is thought this stem cell will be able to turn into any single tissue in the body

Ooh! They have discovered the "Ultimate Stem Cell"!

Could this be... no... a zygote!!!

News Flash

[Anonymous Coward]

Some Jackass on slashdot has made a stupid comment.

The world holds its breath in stunned silence.

Then they realize he's a moron with the socialogical understanding of the bowel movement I made last night.

Re:News Flash

[Chris Burke]

And how are we to guess that your last night's bowel movement is not in fact a Doctor of Philosophy and Social Sciences? You didn't specify.

Re:Rob Malda caught in circle jerk--kills self

[Anonymous Coward]

you're point being...?

Society of biotech patents makes me skeptical

[sam_handelman]

This is excellent science journalism. I'm glad to see the concerns of more skeptical scientists covered in such a balanced fashion. Most of the time, journalists, including those at the New Scientist, breeze past highly important caveats in favor of sensationalism - I'm sure we'll see this story repeated in Pro Life literature, for example, without qualifications. Kudos to Sylvia Westphal (author of the article.)

The fact that the claims being made appear on a patent application instead of in peer-reviewed research makes me extremely skeptical. Showing such a patent application to a member of the press - but not publishing - make me even more so. A great many people (I resist the temptation to post links) involved in Biotech make grandiose claims that they cannot really back up; the huge potential rewards have certainly led to compromises of scientific ethics in the past.

Just because a scientist is fishing for venture captialists does NOT mean that she is doing bad science; it does raise legitimate suspicion about her (Dr. Catherine Verfaillie, who did the work) research.

The "agelessness" and expression of unusual combinations of extracellular markers mentioned in the article are also features common to cancer cells. It is entirely possible that the process of extracting the bone marrow has merely selected out non-tumerogenic, precancerous cells. Such cells, which may very well substitute for stem cells anyway, but probably don't, might also spread through a mouse embryo into which they were injected.

Re:yes

[Anonymous Coward]

Anché Io, finocchio!

And No Murder Required

[Bob Uhl]

How interesting. A few months back various groups were crying out that the wholesale conception and killing of embryos was needed to cure them of their diseases, and that it was simply irresponsible to ask how they justified killing others to save themselves. And now we find that there are viable alternatives to mass-murder. Unfortunately, some embryos were already slain in the headlong rush for knowledge deprived of ethics--but at least no more need be.

It would almost be amusing, were it not so deadly serious.

Now we can get about the serious business of curing disease.

Re:And No Murder Required

[Alsee]

Unfortunately, some embryos were already slain in the headlong rush for knowledge deprived of ethics

To the best of my knowledge there are no known cases of embryos "slain" for the purpose of gathering stem cells. As far as I can tell it has always been the case of harvesting cells from medical waste on the way to the incinerator. They've been recycling their trash. Very Green of them, don't ya think?

now we find that there are viable alternatives to mass-murder.

There is? You mean thousands of GoodChrisianWomen have volunteered to have all this medical waste implanted, and carry it to term? Truely a minor sacrifice compared to allowing someone be thrown in an incinerator and burned alive.

-

Re:And No Murder Required

[Anonymous Coward]

Too bad there is no cure for fanaticism.

Re:For Those That Have Been Slashdotted We Salute

[Anonymous Coward]

New Scientist slashdotted??? snort

karma whore

More Hype

[HarderDeeperFaster]

Relax. It has been known for a while that you can take virtually any cell in the body and start a whole organism from it. Thus, any cell in theory can give rise to any tissue. This paper is just another one of the many examples of hype that is now common place in the biotech world.

Re:"selection process [may actually create] the MA

[DeathBunny]

Since you cannot patent a naturally occuring object, anyone who could reverse engineer the selection process would be able to produce these cells

Nope. While they can't patent a naturally occuring object (I think), they most definately can patent the selection process. Reverse Engineering would definately still be a violation of the patent. Now if they could come up with a *different* process that could still extract the cells in question, that *might* not be a violation of the patent (depending on the exact wording of the patent and the similarities between the processes).

Reverse engineering allows you to get around trade secrets, not patents.

Arm and a leg

[kenneth_martens]

According to the article: ...a patent application seen by New Scientist shows the team has carried out extensive experiments.

This means the patent holders can charge an arm and a leg, literally!

This creates an interesting senario

[Dr. Bent]

Posit:
This process works, exact replicas of human organs can be grown and implanted into patients with phenominal success.

Effect:
Millions of americans decide that quitting smoking, losing weight, and all manner of healthy activity are not worth the trouble because science can simply cure them.

Result:
Health care costs skyrocket. General levels of health decrease.

So I ask...how would we prevent this? Make smokers pay for thier own lung transplants? Alcholoics pay for their own liver?

It makes for an interesting question.

Re:This creates an interesting senario

[Hoi Polloi]

I plan on driving my car into a wall as much as possible because I can get new parts for it. Not likely due to the cost of the parts. Unless the government tries to force the cost of new body parts onto the taxpayer this would be too expensive for most people.

Just wait though, some whiny activist group backed up by biotech $ will come out and say "But what about my sick baby!? What about my 80yr old mother? These parts should be covered by Medicare!". Can't say no to that!

Finally!

[Zen Mastuh]

I can have a second penis. Thank you science!

Re:"selection process [may actually create] the MA

[Don Negro]

What I got from the article was that the voltmeter showed a 48.9V at load, then the machine ran for a while and was turned off, and then it showed 51.2V under the original load. But with more emphasis on description of what a layman saw than on explanation of what was going on, differing understandings are to be expected.

The thing about 3 100W bulbs pulling 4.5kW is obviously crap. I wonder if that's what the man said, or what the journalist thought he understood.

Oh well, if we never hear about it again, we'll know the answer.

breathy?

[Anonymous Coward]

The article is kinda breathy, especially for New Scientist

When timothy called this article breathless, I didn't agree with him, but at least I knew what he was saying.

What on earth does it mean for an article to be "breathy"??

Re:"selection process [may actually create] the MA

[curunir]

Next thing you know, someone will apply for a Nobel Prize because of the momentous discovery that his "dead" flashlight "works" for a few seconds after being turned off for a few minutes.

Well, I don't think that meets the qualifications for a Nobel Prize, but they could probably get a patent on the process.

Re:more killings?

[Anonymous Coward]

And doesn't that core set of beliefs contain things like: stoning others to death, banishment to eternal, burning hell, dehumanization of those who do not believe ..

Whoa, somebody missed out on the second half of the Bible. There's this great thing called the New Testament - give it whirl sometime.

You can't just mix-and-match which passages from scripture you agree with ..

It's not a matter of mixing and matching. The Bible is a story from beginning to end - the revocation of ancient and outdated Jewish laws, replaced by an all-loving and forgiving savior. "That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life."

If you ever get to Hell, please shake Gandhi's hand for me.

Uh-huh. Did I say I think that Ghandi's going to hell? Thanks again for assuming that I'm part of the Pat Robertson groupmind. Christianity is not about condemnation.

Re:This creates an interesting s(c)enario

[Zen Mastuh]

Good point. I think your hypo will occur and millions of Americans (and ROTW) will reward their poor lifestyle decisions with expensive medical fixes, leading to skyrocketing medical/insurance costs. Meanwhile, millions of other Americans are consciously choosing healthy lifestyles not only for the benefits of reduced frequency of illness and reduced medical/insurance costs, but for the benefit of feeling better 24 hours a day.

I think the gap between the two will widen and become more obvious. Hopefully, the problem will beget its own solution as people abandon the endless cycle (well, endless until death...) of bad lifestyle decision followed by painful/expensive medical procedures/drugs and complications, and seek a lifestyle that benefits the body and mind with maximum health and enjoyment.

Slightly OT: The future with Stem Cells

[XBL]

I think it's rather obvious that stel cells are eventually going to be conquered and put to wide usage in medicine... maybe in the near future, or maybe in the far future.

Right now I am 22.. going on 80. In my lifetime, I think that it will be possible for people to extend their lives out as far as they want to, if they have the money.

Basically, I see a time where the rich people will be able to remain ageless, living possibly hundreds of years. Meanwhile, average people would live a normal human life span.

Can you imagine what a social conflict something like this would make? In the past, there have been some very large social class differences, but imagine a gap where one group remains ageless, and another is jealously ageing and dying.

I think that I'm going to start saving my money now...

Re:Slightly OT: The future with Stem Cells

[Anonymous Coward]

(More OT)

I suspect that those people will also have to money to establish isolated communities (it's already happening in a limited fashion in gated communities). Hopefully someone will figure out that orbital/lunar habitats are a good solution.

Re:Slightly OT: The future with Stem Cells

[Hoi Polloi]

Why is it that the people I least want to see live forever are the ones who will?

Re:more killings?

[Anonymous Coward]

There are openly gay bishops, so I wouldn't call consistency within ones believes ...

In reality, I don't really see why that's necessarily inconsistent either. There are specific passages in the Old Testament which deal with homosexuality, but they make just about as much sense today as the passages about stoning prostitutes. The New Testament did away with all those outdated laws.

If someone who pursues a homosexual lifestyle wants to preach the faith, I don't have a problem with that, nor do I consider it to be inconsistent with the Christian belief system. Christianity is about love and acceptance, *not* condemnation, regardless of what Pat Robertson or religious trolls want you to believe.

Re:Rob Malda caught in circle jerk--kills self

[Anonymous Coward]

whoops

Re:more killings?

[Anonymous Coward]

My goodness, that's quite a troll.

Re:"selection process [may actually create] the MA

[truesaer]

Congress could of course set more restrictive limits to patents on things like this if they choose. Remember, the constitution merely gives congress the right to make laws concerning the arts. So, if they want to cap royalties or something, they could. Assuming you could get people to vote for it....its interesting that despite all the talk from some members of congress about drug companies charging too much, not giving poor nations AIDS medecine etc. that no one has tried to just legislate that they cant...

Re:UNITED STATES ATTACKED -- PLEASE READ

[Anonymous Coward]

KEWL!!!

Now how come the local news isn't saying anything about this?

Wild coincidence

[rw2]

I just got out of a colloqium presented by one of the researchers and she was careful to point out that they do not have cells that can fully differentiate, just that they have cells that they have *so far* been able to turn into anything they want. They haven't tried everything yet.

Re:Wild coincidence

[Alsee]

cells that they have *so far* been able to turn into anything they want. They haven't tried everything yet.

Yep. They haven't tried turning them into a Shakeys Pizza yet.

-

Re:more killings?

[Anonymous Coward]

Surely this is not true. I refuse to believe that to donate bone marrow you must kill most of your red blood cells.

Re:"selection process [may actually create] the MA

[rabidcow]

3*100W = 300W = .3kW

Except usually measured over time as kilowatthours:

3*100W*2hr = 600Wh = .6kWh

That generator thing must've been drawing a lot of current!

Also, notice:

The machine went on to run for around two hours while photographs were taken, with no diminution in the brightness of the light bulbs, which remained lit during a short power cut.

Where was the power cut? Not to the lights, they kept lit. Must've been to the generator, for a "short power cut"...

So basically he's got a motor and a capacitor in a huge box. Or maybe just a flywheel.

The real question

[mangu]

Not "When will the Christians of the world wake up and realize that their 'moral standards' are seriously fucked up?" but "when will the religious people of the world wake up and find the difference between 'moral' and 'traditional'?"

Generally, "moral" really means "we have always done it that way".

Of course, tradition is also an important way of keeping a society working. Social tradition is really a set of protocols, just like TCP/IP in computer networks. But we all must agree on procedures for changing obsolete details in old protocols. Just remember to consider all ethical details (as in "avoid needless suffering") as well as technical issues when you discuss the changes.

contradiction in terms

[Anonymous Coward]

"It is thought this stem cell will be able to turn into any single tissue in the body"

Hrm... it's a "stem cell" then, the above is definition of a stem cell.

Re:more killings?

[jsprat]

Surely this is not true. I refuse to believe that to donate bone marrow you must kill most of your red blood cells

Not to donate marrow, but _stem cells_, the cells that can become almost any cell. Your body won't produce them in number without some help.

Marrow, they get with a big fat needle. Painful.

Ah, but...

[devphil]

If every adult human being has these stem cells, then there is the possibility for a person to grow cells (or organs or such) from their very own cells, with their very own DNA.

While this would be an amazing breakthrough, the donation problem would still exist. See, as a diabetic (Type I), growing a replacement pancreas from my own DNA won't help me. The replacement would be just as broken and useless as the one currently propping up my liver (or holding it down, I'm terrible at anatomy). The only thing I get out of this research is plenty of free pancreas-shaped paperweights. ("What a lovely doorstop!" "Thanks, grew it myself.")

I would need one of the super stem cells from somebody with a working pancreas in order to grow a working one of my own. Presumably this wouldn't suffer from the usual tissue rejection problems of transplants.

Re:Ah, but...

[StandardDeviant]

I'm with you on that one. For me it's kidneys. Damned breakable organs! :-) I think (but IANADoc) that the stem-cells-from-other would suffer the same rejection problems, as the cell markers would be different, no? If there was some way to retro in the right codons to make whichever-protein-it-is-that-I-can't-make-right (Alport's syndrome, the protein has alpha-42 in the name iirc), and then grow a replacement (kidney, ear, eye) off of that, that would ROCK. Holy shit, would that rock. Perfectly functioning organ with no need for expensive immunosupressants? I'll buy that for a dollar!

Re:Ah, but...

[DarrylM]

See, as a diabetic (Type I), growing a replacement pancreas from my own DNA won't help me.

I have no idea whatsoever about biology (I is an engineer, after all), but would it be possible to use stem cells from a sibling or parent or other close relative to produce a healthy pancreas instead?

Re:Ah, but...

[drank]

While this would be an amazing breakthrough, the donation problem would still exist. See, as a diabetic (Type I), growing a replacement pancreas from my own DNA won't help me. The replacement would be just as broken and useless as the one currently propping up my liver

While your DNA (and mine too - I'm also a type 1) contains markers that predisposed you to get diabetes, there was also a roll of the dice involved. Some unknown environmental factor - most researchers suspect a virus - triggers the autoimmune attack that actually makes one diabetic.

If you could grow a new pancreas from your own stem cells, it would still contain the markers for diabetes, but it would also contain the same functional, insulin-producing beta cells that you had prior to becoming diabetic. If you never had another autoimmune attack, you'd be non-diabetic for the rest of your life. One quick writeup of this theory can be found in Dr. Bernstein's book.

So far as I've read, a pancreas grown from someone else's cells would face the same tissue rejection issues that you see in today's experimental pancreas transplants.

Re:Ah, but...

[devphil]

I always wondered why I wasn't diabetic until the age of 11 or so... "what was my pancreas /doing/ that first decade" is a question I've always wanted to ask my doctor but could never remember. I guess you answered it. Thanks!

Re:Ah, but...

[devphil]

Well, the kicker with Type I diabetes is that it's genetically inherited; my sibling(s) run the same crap-shoot that I do. So while the chances of rejection are less, the chances of diabetes are just as good (my supposition only). I guess one could use stem cells from the non-diabetic parent as the closest possible match, but that's only 50% to start with.

Re:Ah, but...

[Dyolf Knip]

See, as a diabetic (Type I), growing a replacement pancreas from my own DNA won't help me. The replacement would be just as broken and useless as the one currently propping up my liver

I know nothing about diabetes, so I have to ask. If you were to grow a new pancreas from these cells, it would have the same flaw as the one you've got right now; bummer. But, this one is brand new and is not yet a part of your body. Is there anything that can be done with it in this state to try and repair it?

And as someone else mentioned, they went the first 11 years of their life without requiring insulin injections. Is there a clock on the thing so that it waits a while before deciding to stop working? In which case, would it be feasible to get a new pancreas every decade or so?

Re:Ah, but...

[Peter Harris]

But your siblings only share about 50% of your DNA too. Anyway, I don't know anything about tissue types, but I bet the cells don't have to be identical, just close enough.

Another reason

[taxman_10m]

Another reason to view it as a progressive stance is because, at least in the USA, the whole reason abortion was banned had nothing to do with religion at all. It was banned based on the efforts of the American Medical Association in the 19th century predicated by the new science of embryology, which showed more or less that human life began at conception. This was in contrast to the religious view that the human being did not become alive until quickening, when the fetus moved in the womb.

Not U Minn again!

[Anonymous Coward]

The U of Minn. research team is a nut house. They frequently release immature information, such as this, which turns out to be nothing at all. You can see a list of their problematic announcements, along with some opposite opinions on this specific research, at A. Lexchi University in China.

Yeah right...

[ruiner13]

A super stem cell that can turn into any cell in the body. What next? Free energy? Perpertual motion?

Ah crap... nevermind.

;)

What?

[DapperDan]

What? (Pardon me for summarizing some of your points)

Medicine-for-profit is bad.

How is anything-for-profit inherently bad?

If there was no profit pharmaceuticals would have no reason to continue spending billions on research and making drugs from that research.

I agree. Why would anyone invest billions in something if they expected nothing in return?

Medicine-for-profit has denied you treatment.

M-f-p may have (in the form of HMO's it sounds) denied you treatment. The fact that you are taking drugs that were made precisely because of profit potential tells me that you have benefited from m-f-p, and most likely quite a bit more than you have been denied.

Isn't it sometimes true

[xg0blin]

That scientists will exaggerate a teensy bit sometimes to get funding? I don't know if I would buy this outright.

Did ethical concerns drive this research?

[Anonymous Coward]

So, did moral/ethical pressure, help focus peoples attention on something other that ESC research?

A Success of Ethics I guess.

Careful here!

[HiThere]

Some ageless cells are cancer.

Some are the sources of sperm and ova.

Some are probably the source of the blood, villi, skin, etc. (Yes, there are cells that aren't totipotent that are the sources here, but they don't have any obvious aging built in.)

If there are a few totipotent stem cells in an adult, it wouldn't be any big surprise. There probably won't be many of them, as they would be (are?) quite dangerous (one little mutation and ...), but they aren't automatically cancerous.
.

not to troll excessively....

[evilpaul13]

But I seem to recall seeing that adults have stem cells. Using embryos was just a matter of convenience. Those people who have recovered from severe nervous system injuries had to get new nerve cells from somewhere.

Re:not to troll excessively....

[3am]

I could very well be wrong, but I have studied this a little. You can't recover from a severe enough CNS injury - the reason that some people can show improvement is that existing neurons will attempt to grow to reach other neurons, creating new connections. And when some connections survive a trauma, a person can (tortuously) re-learn tasks using the existing connections (essentially remapping brain to body connections).

Anyway, i'm no MD. But I am fairly certain that one doesn't re-grow neurons when recovering from a CNS injury (although I've heard of research where they found adult brains do have new neurons in them. The wonder of science). However, I'm pretty sure you're right that adults have stem cells - only they're not completely undifferentiated like embryonic stem cells or the ones supposedly discovered/created in the above article.

The bad news is....

[BlackGriffen]

that if the damage stems from genetic causes, the stem cells will still have to be repaired before a new organ is cultured. The interesting thing is that the body doesn't reject stem cells from other people; at least in the brain. BlackGriffen

Eh?

[p3d0]

``Perpetual motion is impossible. This is a self-sustaining unit which at the same time provides surplus electrical energy,'' he said.

Phew, at least it's not a perpetual motion machine then.

Re:Eh?

[p3d0]

Nice one. Not only did I post a redundant comment; I attached it to the wrong article. Some please mod parent article into the oblivion it deserves. (It's ok, I have plenty of karma.)

HOAX!

[rice_burners_suck]

I hate to be the one to break this to you, but this is a hoax.

Here's the proof: I haven't personally seen it. That means it doesn't exist. It is a fact of the universe. You know why? Because the entire universe revolves around me. Hey, that's the proof. It's a hoax..O.H. .W.E.L.L.

Multipotent Cells a Matter of Process

[bonoboy]

It states in the article that certain people believe the cells are produced by the process, not that they already exist and are simply refined.

Is it just me, or was there news in the past year or so from people that had found that making cells dormant on minimal media (the same way they prepare cells for cloning) actually made them multipotent anyway? Does anyone else remember this?

Ultimate Stem Cell ===Ultimate Steak

[Sean Clifford]

Why grow brain cells when you can grow...the Ultimate Steak! Imagine growing meat in a vat instead of hacking up steer or chickens.

Bad news for dentists....

[Anonymous Coward]

...good for me though - I could use some new teeth, probably a whole set by the time they get the process perfected... ;)

Re:more killings?

[junkgrep]

But if he was an aborted baby, he wouldn't have the capacity to care, or "realize" anything about anything. And wouldn't be here talking to us, so the point is moot.

Re:more killings?

[junkgrep]

To be fair, the second half has many of the same moral atrocities of the first. Jesus not only condones the stoning of unruly children, he scolds the Pharisees for NOT doing it. And who invented the concept of eternal torment again?

But to be fair to you, this guy's a moron. You aren't playing into his straw man conception of Christianity, and he's actually got the nerve to YELL AT YOU for it, as if your failure to be an easy target was something you should feel guilty about! Maybe someday he'll grow up and realize that Christianity is an incredibly diverse grouping of beliefs. They may almost always stem out of the Bible, but that doesn't even remotely mean that it is used or thought of in the same way by everyone.

Re:more killings?

[junkgrep]

---The New Testament did away with all those outdated laws.---

That's not entirely true, and certainly very debateable. The New Testament is more cryptic, but Christians who dislike homosexuality have had no trouble finding passages that support their views.

But it does raise an interesting question for debate: is the Christian god a moral reletavist. How else can what is moral one day be immoral the next, and vice-versa?

Growing meat in a vat?

[Anonymous Coward]

How do you think they make SPAM?

Or spammers, for that matter.

Air travel already exceeds population growth

[Adam J. Richter]

No space-based expatration system is going to ship enough people off this planet to make the slightest bit of difference. There are 250,000 new people on this planet, ever single day. That is net of deaths, by the way.

250,000 people per day is 91.25 million people per year. According to this slide, European air travel was 541 million passengers in 1998, almost six times your figure for world population growth.

stem cell theory

[Anonymous Coward]

stem cells have long been suspected to exist in adults and mainly in the bone marrow. the reason for the high concentration in the bone marrow is that the marrow is responsible for massive amounts of very different types of cells in the blood. no other tissue in the adult body has similar requirements.

however almost every tissue in an embryo does.

the real breakthrough (in my opinion) was finding these cell in a embryo and proving the stem cell theory, after that the main point of debate has been 1.) do stem cells exist in the adult body and 2.) do they exist in detectable concentrations

I'm not saying that these researchers have found the cells, that is what every stem cell researcher in the world is currently trying to do, what I am saying is that there have been very large amounts of money and time spent looking for these cells (and mainly in the bone marrow) so I wouldn't be surprised. Estatic, full of wonder, but not as surprised as I would of been if I read about a zero point energy machine that looked like a washing machine.

cheers

What about spontaneous abortions?

[Rob Simpson]

Heck, they could just get them from spontaneous abortions (aka "miscarriages") which make up more than 50% of pregnancies. Yup, more than half of those "new humans" die, often before the woman even notices. Compared to this, surgical abortions are small potatoes...

Re:What about spontaneous abortions?

[Anonymous Coward]

100% of all humans die. Compared to this, murder, war, and terrorism are small potatoes.

multipotent=!totipotent

[Rob Simpson]

Stem cells are common in the body - eg: cells in the bone marrow produce many different types of blood cells. These are multipotent/pluripotent cells, cells that can either divide to make more of themselves or differentiate into one of several "end" cells, like red blood cells, platelets, etc.

The stem cells this article is talking about - the embryonic ones and the newly discovered adult ones - are totipotent cells, cells that can differentiate into ANYTHING you want.

Adult vs embryonic stem-cells

[koekepeer]

What country do you live in that doesn't allow ADULT stem-cell research?

Which is rather strange, don't you agree? Essentially, these researchers have shown that there are "adult" stem-cells that behave identical to embryonic stem-cells. If the lawmakers would think logically, they'd apply the same regulations to research with "adult" stem-cells.

Re:Adult vs embryonic stem-cells

[japhmi]

Which is rather strange, don't you agree? Essentially, these researchers have shown that there are "adult" stem-cells that behave identical to embryonic stem-cells. If the lawmakers would think logically, they'd apply the same regulations to research with "adult" stem-cells.

Except you don't have to kill anyone to get adult stem cells...

Re:ageless cells? (mod this up!)

[Anonymous Coward]

It is factual and mostly correct. I'm a molecular biologist so I should know ;-)

Posting anonymously to escape the /. karma police (hehe as if they're not registering my ip adress)

OZ discovery

[Anonymous Coward]

Something very similar was done in Australia not long ago. The stem cell i believe was found in the brain.

Its was an important find because at the time the only place to find stem cells where in unborn babies.

--------
Rodney McDonell

Re:"selection process [may actually create] the MA

[Alsee]

At first I was sceptical.
How could he possibly have "supplied all his own domestic power needs free for 17 months"? IMPOSSIBLE!

But then I was convinced! It's true! Just look at the first sentence of the article! The "birthplace of such an epoch-making discovery" is "A cold stone house on a wind-swept Irish hillside".

-

sperm + egg?

[peter303]

This fits this criterion!

My God.....Thank-you!!!!

[the_2nd_coming]

I hope that this is what it seems to be.......If they can make organs from the same tissue of the recipiant using these cells, this can save a lot of lifes!!!!

My son was born with chronic renal failure.....he needs a transplant when he is a year old..........if this can allow him, when he gets older, to have a new organ produced from his own body.......I can't wait........

Re:My God.....Thank-you!!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Where are we going to stick all these people who never die?

Re:My God.....Thank-you!!!!

[the_2nd_coming]

fuck the old people......I only care about my son damn it....if I kill my liver from years of alcohol abuse....I deserve to die, but being born with a congenital disorter that can be fixed with this.....Babies and children should have a chance to have a healthy life.

Ah, but... Now it can be fixed!

[HiThere]

Well, maybe not "Now", but when you have an isolated cell, you have a cell that you can modify the genes of. Just change that particular part of the code. (Think of it as debugging.)

Perhaps a plasmid would be good enough. That would make things simpler. But even if the nucleotide sequence needed to be altered this isn't impossible. Then you grow the pancreas (lots of work to do to make this work, too) from the repaired cells. Now you have a pancreas without the original defect.

This works unless the defect is in the immune system rather than in the pancreas. In that case there is a need to purge the immune system of the sensitized cells. Ugh! But progress is occuring on that front, too.

In either case, once a few major problems are solved (including how to pay for all this) ...

One of the big benefits of the ban on human cloning is that the process isn't really ready. There's too much ancillary work that needs to be done. And there was never a ban on the cloning of chimpanzees or gorillas, which are so close to human that all major processes are the same, anyway. (Well, people are cheaper, and rightly so! But pigs are pretty cheap, and monkeys aren't too bad, and are pretty close.)
.

Rats of NIMH

[elmer-12]

"She placed single MAPCs from humans and mice into very early mouse embryos, when they are just a ball of cells. Analyses of mice born after the experiment reveal that a single MAPC can contribute to all the body's tissues."

Is this how the Rats of NIMH were born?

Re:"selection process [may actually create] the MA

[Anonymous Coward]

they could come up with a *different* process that could still extract the cells

Sorry, that is what I meant. I dind't mean reverse engineering the exact same process, just reverse engineering in the sense that unlike the patent holders, the 'reverse engineers' would actually know that such cells were at least a probable outcome of various manipulations to remove the non- 'stem-cell-like' cells from the marrow.

unnatural make something immoral

[Jagasian]

Claiming that unnatural implies immoral is the one of the oldest ethical fallacies still in use. It has been used during the dark ages and most likely it has even been used by such lovely governments as the Taliban.

Lets do a little reductio ad absurdum. The only natural form of transportation for a human is to use your legs, arms, etc to move about. From this we see that using a car as a means of transportation is unnatural. Therefore, using a car is immoral.

Not only that, but any form of artificial insemenation or stuff like test tube (petri dish) conception is by definition unnatural and therefore immoral.

Modern medicine in and of itself is immoral. I mean, you are "playing god" by giving people drugs that make them live longer.

Computers are unnatural and therefore immoral. We are practically playing god by making this virtual world we call cyberspace.

The entire field of artificial intelligence is immoral.

Just because people are ignorant or even stupid does not mean that you should work within their incorrect ethical system and its silly moral boundries.

Re:unnatural make something immoral

[Mr_Matt]

Lets do a little reductio ad absurdum. The only natural form of transportation for a human is to use your legs, arms, etc to move about. From this we see that using a car as a means of transportation is unnatural. Therefore, using a car is immoral.

Where in the above two posts have you missed the point where I stated that I was playing the devil's advocate? Here's a clue, smart-guy - I agree with you. Tell it to the unwashed masses, not me. :)

Just because people are ignorant or even stupid does not mean that you should work within their incorrect ethical system and its silly moral boundries.

See, this only shows how little you know about the whole funding system. You're right, of course, but good luck paying the bills working on principle alone, outside of whatever "incorrect", "silly" or "stupid" boundaries you may find. Because when those "incorrect" "silly" and "stupid" people run the government, guess who gets screwed?

Beside, who the hell am I to decide what is "incorrect" "silly" and "stupid"? Am I so fucking sure about how right I am to write everybody else off? Look, all I'm saying is this: wackos with money have a right to decide what they want to support with their money, no matter how wacky they are. The research will still get done - remember Goodyear in his basement vulcanizing rubber at the expense of food/heat/etc.? - but it'll take longer, at least until we:

• iron out the "ethical" issues, or
  
• convice those who disagree with us that they're wrong, and we alone are right.
  

Good luck with the latter, until then, I think we need to work on the former.

God Bless the U.S.

[Snover]

And we still won't be able to DO anything with the stem cells since Bush doesn't like them. What'd they ever do to him (besides possibly erecting him as the ugliest man alive)?

NYTimes picked it up

[TheGreatGraySkwid]

Guess this story adds another reasonably reputable source to the mix...