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Grow Your Own Replacement Bones
Tim writes "New Scientist reports on a German man who had a complete jaw transplant, after having his cancerous jawbone removed nine years ago. The twist? This jawbone was grown on his shoulder, using a titanium mold, bone marrow, and recombinant bone morphogenic protein." There's also a BBC story.
Umm, this really isn't for people with your typical broken bone. This is for people that need a bone replacement.
It only took seven weeks to grow the replacement jaw-piece and then only four more weeks until it was successfully grown into place.
For some reason I was under the impression that they had grown him an entire new jaw but that was obviously not the case as they only grew him a piece of his jawbone back. He still has no teeth and the doctors claim he can get a set next year.
Wow.
Besides, this was done in Germany. Even if the Theocratic States of America succeed in shutting down all medical progress, they're happy to outsource this sort of thing. Need a new kidney? Fly to Germany, they'll be happy to grow you a new one.
John
Don't believe the FUD. Bush is not against stem cell research. He has prevented such research that involves the destruction of human embryos from receiving federal funding. Research involving stem cells from adults, animals, and cord blood, which are all highly promising, is federally funded and ongoing.
--riney
I agree completely that stem cell research must not be restricted, the potential benefits are simply ming-boggling. But the Associated Press article I read earlier today which covers this same story, however, states that "it's not clear any major scientific ground has been broken, and tests may not be able to show whether the new bone came from stem cells, rather than from the growth factor alone." So in this case stem cells might not have anything to do with the results. That article is pretty detailed as well.
If you want to see more pictures, you can find them here.
A quote in that story, from Paul Brown, head of the Center for Tissue Regeneration Science at University College in London:
A common misconception here on /. is that Bush is against stem cell research. The fact is that he's not. He is against stem cell harvesting from aborted fetuses. The law he signed bans only federal funding for stem cell research that uses fetus stem cells. This does not prevent private research in this area at all. In fact, there are now ways to harvest stem cells from adults, and thus doesn't have the same moral complications as the previous method.
Actually, since this all happened in Germany, and not in the US, I think it is a pretty good case against Bush's stem cell "policy" (more like religious idiocy, imho).
My wife finished her undergrad genetics degree (at a Canadian university) a couple of years ago, and even then she noticed an increase in the number of people from the US coming up for grad studies, since the type of work they needed to do with stem cells just wasn't possible in the US.
Stem cell research is going to happen, with or without Bush. The only variable is the country in which it is going to happen, and right now it ain't the US.
"The market alone cannot provide sufficient constraints on corporation's penchant to cause harm." -- Joel Bakan
I had fusion done in my neck, C5, C6, C7, in 1998. The Doc went in through the front with a scope, removed the 2 ruptured disks. Then put bone plugs from the donor bank in and screwed a titanium plate to the front. Five weeks later I was back at work as a mechanic. I worked on lighter stuff as much as possible but was up to full strength in six months. No problems since.
Good Luck.
Professional Politicians are not the solution, they ARE the problem.