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Scientists Claim Organs Grown From Stem Cells
Llywelyn writes: "It appears that some scientists in the United States are claiming that they have been able to grow functional organs (kidneys) from cloned cow embryotic stem cells. They have not yet released details on how exactly they did this, nor have they yet provided evidence for their claims, but admit to being only in the `proof of concept' phase in research. I guess we'll see down the road if this is legit or the increasingly common `Science by Press Release.'"
I've done it, and you can't see my evidence!
Sorry, can't consider it news until we see evidence.
For all we know, they are raving lunatics, or just getting media attention for more grant money.
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
This company is the same one that claimed to have cloned human embryos, so we're already aware of their preference of press releases to peer-reviewed journals.
ACT is not the friendly non-profit down the street supported by charity and gov't grants and staffed with university-affiliated researchers. The charities don't have this money and the US gov't is trying to decide if it should tolerate or squash these folks and in the meantime is such a slow & conflicted funding mess they're not worth the bother. And academia - they've either lost many of their best and brightest to these shops or are desperately trying to form "partnerships" in order to keep in the loop and when it rains gravy to catch a few drops.*
Rather there's lots of hungry investors with deep pockets willing to invest and get these folks the best equipment and shield them from committees and reviews and university politics and such until they're ready to ship. All these folks have to do is get cracking and produce some encouraging results regularly which in ACTs case is what they are doing.
Were their previous results controversial? Yes - possibly overstated. Is this one - possibly again. They've grown *something*, possibly successfully, possibly not. Nobody knows exactly what yet but that's not ACTs point, theirs is that they've even gotten this far. When they find out if it works then they'll announce that too but they're just announcing all of their milestones as they go along.
So why are they doing this? PR. Not just the we-need-funds PR that so many folks are used to seeing (ACT seems fine that way) but also the Hey-the-21st-century-is-coming-at-you way so when ACT does have something to sell the market is ready to buy. Those nice comfortable theoretical debates are becoming much realer much faster then anyone imagined and it's in ACTs interest to have they and the market mature when a product is availiable.
Finally - why aren't the procedures and details being released? Because this is leading-edge privately funded research worth billions. If the public wants access to it then it can darn well pay for it. No money for uneasy biotech and too bizarre a regulatory climate and it'll happen anyway just without public participation and without sharing.
The Genie is out of the bottle kids. Either work with it to shape it to needs and values at its rate of growth or fail to keep up and lose all control.
-- Michael
* For the computer-centric folks this is the same as happened to CS departments in the 80's & 90's. All of the action moved out to industry along with the silly money. If you wanted in on the action you had to get off campus. Nobody has ethical concerns if Cisco announces a routing breakthrough unlike biotech announcing a grown organ but it's really the same business model applied to a different field.
I don't read ACs: If a post isn't worth so much as a nom de plume to its author then I wont bother either.
However, look at the situation:
Tens of thousands of researchers (yes, including federally funded ones) have been working on cancer treatment, in an effort that has gone on longer than anyone here has been alive. This could be because:
a. Evil capitalist greed is preventing the publication of the many potential cures that are right around the corner.
b. Curing cancer is a really hard problem.
I understand why you're angry enough to guess "a", but I don't think you're right.