Stem Cells Cure Paralyzed Rats

An anonymous reader writes "According to an article on Forbes as well as other sources, 'Scientists have used [embryonic] stem cells and a soup of nerve-friendly chemicals to not just bridge a damaged spinal cord but actually regrow the circuitry needed to move a muscle, helping partially paralyzed rats walk.'"

Comments

If only...

[Spad]

If only they put this much time and effort into finding cures for human conditions instead of wasting it all on rodents. Bloody mice get all the breaks.

Re:If only...

[rbarreira]

Except that maybe the mouse will be smashed with a hammer later on the day :)

Well, not always, there's a girl living near me who has a big RAT in her apartment. Reason: She (the girl, the rat no longer) works at a laboratory, knew that they were going to kill the rat and decided to take it home instead so that it wouldn't happen, and also because "it's so cute". The only problem is the chewed cables and bed sheets...

Re:If only...

[bsartist]

Bloody mice get all the breaks.

I don't think you really want the kind of "breaks" those mice got.

Re:If only...

[oudzeeman]

Interesting that she is allowed to keep a rodent pet when she works in a laboratory, even though the rodent originally came from the lab...I work at a genetics research laboratory, and I'm not allowed to keep mice, rats, guinepigs, or hampsters as a pet at home, or keep any animal as a pet that eats any of the forementioned rodents as its normal food (cats are okay, even though they might occasionally catch mice).

The fear is that someone could introduce a parasite, virus, or bacterial infection into one of the mouse colonies, which would be devistating to our research (http://www.jax.org/research/research_areas.html), and our mouse business (http://jaxmice.jax.org/index.html). I don't handle the lab mice, or even come in close proximity of the mice on a regular basis since I'm a software engineer and this restriction still applies to me.

Re:If only...

[Anonymous Coward]

I work at a genetics research laboratory, and I'm not allowed to keep mice, rats, guinepigs, or hampsters as a pet at home

If the lab you work in is part of Jackson Labs, that's a reasonably paranoid restriction. If a university lab has an infection problem, they're often small enough to treat the issue medically. If not, they can buy a fresh population from, say, Jackson Labs. Jackson needs to have the equivalent of "five-nines" reliability in their animals, where a univeristy vivarium is usually happy with two or thee nines.

Re:If only...

[I Like Pudding]

If only they put this much time and effort into finding cures for human conditions instead of wasting it all on rodents.

Please. Broken spine? Cured! Mysterious foot pain? Cured! Crippling halitosis? Cured!

Re:If only...

[oudzeeman]

while it would suck having to give up my girlfriends, at least I would still have my wife

Re:If only...

[deadlinegrunt]

"while it would suck having to give up my girlfriends, at least I would still have my wife"

Wait - you have girlfriends and a wife? And you are a /. user? So the girlfriend thinks you are with the wife and the wife thinks you are with the girlfriend - leaving more time for the computer. Brilliant!

Re:If only...

[Anonymous Coward]

I work in a research lab in a University and the same rules apply. I can't own rodents, chickens, reptiles or amphibians - period. The purpose of this rule is as the previous poster says - to prevent infection of research animals with diseases from the outside world.

If I took research animals home the penalties would be pretty stiff. But the problem here is the reverse. Any animal that leaves the lab could enter the food chain and cause problems down the line. With the number of mutant mice and mice treated with viruses out there I think it's a pretty wise precaution.

Re:If only...

[Thomas Miconi]

while it would suck having to give up my girlfriends, at least I would still have my wife

I'm confused. Which one is the rat ?

For those

[celardore]

For those rats who did not regain use of their limbs after the experiment, little miniature wheelchairs and sticks were provided.

Let's just tell the animal rights protestors that anyway.

Re:For those

[MancunianMaskMan]

I am a rat, you insensitive clod (or so my friends say anyway).

Oh wait... I haven't got any.

Re:For those

[Idarubicin]

Let's just tell the animal rights protestors that anyway.

Please don't tell the animal rights people anything. Please! Tell them that we're working with nuclear weapons or lasers or something.

One of my coworkers worked in a Drosophilia (fruit fly) lab as a summer student some number of years ago. One Monday morning, he came in to the lab to wryly smiling colleagues. Apparently, animal rights activists had broken in to the lab over the weekend, and set all of the fruit flies 'free'. Unfortunately, this particular lab was working with curly-wing and wingless mutants, so the freed flies took a few tottering steps, then fell out of their open tubes and collected on the floor.

Re:For those

[celardore]

I know, I know... Animal protesters are ridiculous. They were protesting outside my workplace a while back. Reason? We deliver stuff to a research centre. Could be pencils & pens, who knows - but the animal activists wanted us to put a stop to it! Needless to say, we got a court injunction against them.

My boss wouldn't let me throw eggs (from battery hens) at them. Spoilsport.

Re:For those

[SargeantLobes]

Unfortunately, this particular lab was working with curly-wing and wingless mutants, so the freed flies took a few tottering steps, then fell out of their open tubes and collected on the floor.

Lab animals being set free often end up like that. They've been in labs for their entire lifespan (which is required, because all the variables need to be known and controllable), and they don't know how to fend for them selves. All those mice being set free usually just curl up somewhere and die. They don't really know how to look for food (they just nibble everything), and they don't know to run from predators.

Animal rights activists don't usually know anything about animals/nature. Animal rights acivists got egg collecting (from a rare species of bird, that lays it's eggs in fields) banned here last year. What they didn't know was, that when the colletors collected the first batch (which usually freezes to death) they put a flag near the nests so the farmer wouldn't drive over it. So all those years it was the egg collecting sustaining their existance (farmers don't go around putting flags near nests just for the heck of it, they've go 'better' things to do.

Re:For those

[PixelScuba]

I know! And this one time, there were these people who were totally protesting abortion clinics, they were all on the lawn yelling at people telling the women coming in they were muderers and throwing things at them and the doctors! This is why all Anti Abortion activists are ridiculous!

The point I was getting at is that there are clearly lunatics in any movement, but those are the only ones you hear from. Rarely do you hear about animal rights activists who understand the need for many medical experiments on animal, but hope to see those animals treated with some level of dignity (I dunno, maybe breeding too many lab mice and just throwing extras away). I would wager you could call me an "animal rights activist", I think abusing pets should be punished, I've never really been in favor of cosmetic testing on animals, and I think Humans do have a degree of responsibility in taking care of whatever we can... but I don't set lab mice free, or tell how we shouldn't test medical advances on animals. I just feel there is a level of decency we can exhibit in these cases... set a few ground rules for respectfully dealing with animals and their use in medicine, and follow them. I hope that that request isn't too "Ridiculous".

Re:For those

[Anonymous Coward]

they were all on the lawn yelling at people telling the women coming in they were muderers and throwing things at them and the doctors!

The sad thing is that the vast majority of these "Family Planning" clinics also provide services for people who are keeping their kids, and in some more rural regions are the only prenatal clinic in the area. But hey, let's shut them down, the health of women be damned, and if the baby doesn't make it because of the lack of care, at least the mother didn't "kill" it! I've never seen any churches open up free prenatal clinics to compete against the clinics providing free services sponsored by abortions, putting their money where their mouths are just isn't "God's work". God wants that money to go to building bigger temples with more gold trim.

So yes, the majority of anti-abortion activists are ridiculous, hypocritical sheeple who just do whatever the 700 club tells them to do.

Re:For those

[Zaatxe]

A few weeks ago I saw in a newspaper that a company in England was selling bottled water in which the bottles are made of a special kind of plastic, made with corn flour. The nice thing is that this plastic can vanish in 70-90 days when exposed to the elements. The funny note was that Greenpeace didn't approve this plastic, because "it could be made with transgenic corn". The question is, is there a way to please environmentalists and animal rights activists?

This is amazing

[Anonymous Coward]

We must immediately ensure that this life-changing new medical technology is placed under a raft of arbitrary and politically motivated legal restrictions.

We must do this as quickly as possible. For science!

Re:This is amazing

[MillionthMonkey]

Oh wait, the president only said that federal funding wouldn't be available, he didn't actually ban anything (except human cloning), now did he? In fact, there aren't really a 'raft of restrictions' at all, just a short list of stem cell lines for which federal funding is available, and not for any others.

Oh wait, you have no idea how science gets funded in this country, and are parroting a talking point that someone prepared for your consumption. Most scientific research depends on federal funding. The stem cell lines on the "short list" are useless because there are so few of them and they are now contaminated with the cells from other animals that are used to keep the stem cells alive. The Bush ban isn't a matter of the government paying for all your lab costs except for particular stem cell lines which get crossed off as a line item. If any lab in any scientific research organization touches a non-Bush-approved stem cell line, it "poisons" the entire organization "GPL-style" and all federal funding gets cut off for all research that the organization might be doing whether it is related to stem cells at all or not. That will effectively shut it down.

If this is the universal panacea that it's being touted to be, then there should be no difficulty finding state, local, or private funding sources. You just can't feed out of the FEDERAL money-trough on this one.

The voters of the state of California approved Prop 71 which set up a bond for a stem-cell research in the state as a result of the federal funding restriction. The state would be getting a new non-federal research facility that would not be tainted by a single dollar of federal funding for equipment or office supplies or anything. Unfortunately, construction on the facility has now been held up for years now because of lawsuits from litigious wingnuts.

Re:Also works as a gender change medicine!

[LMacG]

Gender? o.O

John Hopkins == NIHM!!

[bloodredsun]

Life imitates Art yet again.

...literally...

[OscarBlock]

From the article ""They did something that people have been trying to do for at least 30 years and literally hit a brick wall until now," said Dr. Naomi Keitman..."

Is this why they developed an interest in repairing spinal cord injuries? I think we should be told...

Got ya

[overbaud]

"bridge a damaged spinal cord" so if anyone is thinking of sticking their head in a life sized rat trap... good news!

Reconnecting Nerves is like hand soldering

[LiquidCoooled]

a Surface mount chip.
Its always going to be messy and you will likely fuse the wrong things together.
But having some movement/sensation is good so Thumbs (and index finger) up to this research.

Re:Reconnecting Nerves is like hand soldering

[bsartist]

But having some movement/sensation is good

I think you've underestimated the level of improvement. I saw a before/after video of this on last night's network news. Before the treatment, the rat's back half was totally paralyzed. After, it was completely mobile, although it did look like one leg was a little stiff. So we're not talking about just being able to wiggle a few toes here, we're talking about getting up and walking around, albeit with a bit of a limp.

A better link for that video would be appreciated, btw - the above requires IE and MS Media Player.

Re:Reconnecting Nerves is like hand soldering

[fodder69]

The difference being that the cpu (brain) can recognize those miswired connections and reroute them to work properly. Usually.

Re:Reconnecting Nerves is like hand soldering

[alohatiger]

I think remapping is more appropriate. It's like the experiment where you put on prism glasses that invert what you see. Initially everything is upside down. After a while you don't notice. At the end of the day when you take the glasses off, everything looks upside down for a while.

Question

[Francisco_G]

Who paralyzes the rats in the first place? Do the scientists step on 'em?

Re:Question

[Anonymous Coward]

Spinal injuries are pretty common sports injuries so the real question is did the scientist have to teach the rats to ski and play football first? I can't believe there are enough wheel accidents to provide a decent test group.

Re:Question

[ceeam]

You say "back breaker" and I imagine 300 pounds wrestler doing piledrivers and shit on poor mice.... Ooh.. Nice.

Re:Question

[poot_rootbeer]

Who paralyzes the rats in the first place? Do the scientists step on 'em?

Not the scientists, no. That what lab assistants are for! I wish I was joking.

Actually, they probably design some sort of rat-spine-breaking device so the assistants can paralyze them more uniformly than could be achieved just by stepping on them. I wish I was joking about that too.

If this goes commercial...

[dartarrow]

...would viagra go out of business...?

Re:If this goes commercial...

[gstoddart]

...would viagra go out of business...?

Of course not, and asking means you understand neither how an erection (and Viagara) work nor how spinal cord injuries work.

Viagara is a Vasoconstrictor which causes blood vessels to contract. It was developed for other clinical applications, and had the happy side effect of granting erections to people. Except for a few people, it's probably not used very much for its original purpose.

Using stem cells to re-connect severed nerves means that the conduit to transmit nerve impulses had been severed. Think spinal cord injuries. This technique allowed them to re-connect themselves and return mobility.

For the record, a quadraplegic can probably get an erection (give or take some injury-specific considerations) -- they may not be able to feel it, but they can have one. A spinal cord injury doesn't cause impotence, it causes loss of voluntary muscular control. The blood still flows, and many of the other muscles involved are involuntary anwyay.

So, NO, stemm cells to repair spinal cords will probably not affect the sales of Viagara. (Unless people who can suddenly walk again decide they also want to buy viagara.) Completely different body systems are affected by the two.

Cheers

rats or mice

[illtron]

So are they rats or mice? Headline says mice, summary says rats. They're not the same thing. Think before you write!

Re:rats or mice

[ElleyKitten]

So are they rats or mice? Headline says mice, summary says rats. They're not the same thing. Think before you write!

From the article:

First, Kerr mixed embryonic stem cells from mice with chemicals that caused them to turn into motor neurons. He transplanted them into the spinal cords of partially paralyzed rats.

Uhh, so both then? Or maybe the reporter is confused too?

This is what we're talking about

[Cleon]

Really, this exemplifies the sort of research we've been talking about when it comes to stem cells. Unfortunately, the actual scientific possibilities were overshadowed by a bunch of political bullshit.

Stem cells, biology (evolution!), global warming...The subjection of science to political considerations has to stop.

Re:This is what we're talking about

[richpoore]

Did the article say if it was adult stemm cells or embryonic stem cells were used. It seems to me it doesn't need to be a political issue. Use adult stem cells. They've shown much promise in humans.

Re:This is what we're talking about

[indifferent children]

These were probably rat stem cells, so who cares whether they were adult or embryonic?

Re:This is what we're talking about

[CRCulver]

Unfortunately, the actual scientific possibilities were overshadowed by a bunch of political bullshit.

One could just as easily say "Ach, mein Fuerher, too bad the actual scientific possibilities of eugenics were overshadowed by a bunch of moral concerns." Part of subscribing to a moral code is realizing that its requirements are overriding. If embryos are considered human beings, which at least according to statistics of religious affiliation (add up the number of Roman Catholics, Orthodox, and non-mainline Protestants) is a belief held by the vast majority of the Western world, then one simply cannot experiment on embryos no matter how much one desires to see the results.

It seems like a lot of Slashdot posters think that the best thing human beings could do is just junk whatever moral notions they have about the dignity of the human person, and just do a lot of crazy whizbang scientific experiments just because they are there.

Re:This is what we're talking about

[Alinabi]

Part of subscribing to a moral code is realizing that its requirements are overriding.

Here is the thing about moral codes: individuals subscribe to them according to their own beliefs. The government has no business legislating them. If christians of various flavors have a problem with stem cell research, they are free to refuse treatments based on it.

Re:This is what we're talking about

[CRCulver]

Here is the thing about moral codes: individuals subscribe to them according to their own beliefs. The government has no business legislating them. If christians of various flavors have a problem with stem cell research, they are free to refuse treatments based on it.

Many moral codes require that one do one's utmost to save innocent human life. One is not permitted to simply look over the taking of human life, as you suggest when you say that "they can just refuse treatment". Now, legislative power is a means to protect life in this case, therefore it is entirely sensible that it be used for such a purpose.

You obviously disagree with the viewpoint against the use of embryonic stem cells. Fine. But don't try to pretend that that viewpoint simply doesn't exist. It does exist, and those who hold it have certain responsibilities toward it. Surely in order to obtain a university degree you did the obligatory Ethics course.

Re:This is what we're talking about

[hasbeard]

Here is the thing about moral codes: individuals subscribe to them according to their own beliefs. The government has no business legislating them. If christians of various flavors have a problem with stem cell research, they are free to refuse treatments based on it.

Do you really believe "The government has no business legislating [moral codes]"? Does that mean that you won't care if someone kidnaps your children, hacks into your back accounts and empties them out, steals your car, and backs a moving van up to your home and empties it? Some people believe that the government's job is to help protect its people--all its people, including the unborn. Abortion and creating embryos (human lives) for the purpose of using their parts are morally wrong and the government would be remiss in not prohibiting them.

Re:This is what we're talking about

[ElleyKitten]

There's a lot of Christians who don't believe that embryos are people. You can't just look religious affiliation stats and say that all of these people believe this, because they don't.

Also, we're not talking late-term fetuses that look like babies. We're not talking about fetuses like the ones you see on ultrasounds. We're talking about microscopic eggs that have been fertilized for a few days. If they were in a woman, she wouldn't know. If they failed to implant or miscarried, she'd never notice. However, they're not in a woman. Most embryos for stem cell research come from fertility clinics, extras created for backup and then unneeded, so they will never go in a woman and grow into a baby. If they weren't donated to science, they'd be thrown away. I for one, would rather they be used to help people, or even animals, rather than be thrown away.

Re:This is what we're talking about

[CRCulver]

There's a lot of Christians who don't believe that embryos are people. You can't just look religious affiliation stats and say that all of these people believe this, because they don't.

If they profess membership in a church and don't actually agree with the church, then that makes them hypocrites. Seems like quite a problem, don't you think?

Re:This is what we're talking about

[stud9920]

Meanwhile in Europe, 400m godless baby eaters are wondering what the fuss is all about, if they even are aware of it...

Re:This is what we're talking about

[plunge]

"Part of subscribing to a moral code is realizing that its requirements are overriding."

But at least when talking about laws and actions in the real world, I'd like to only include moral reasons that actually have a real world basis. Claiming that stem cells have tiny little souls is as useful in a moral debate as claiming that rocks have then and geology is evil. If someone thinks that killing a stem cell is wrong, then they've as much sent up a giant firework that blows up and displays the words "I have no idea what morality is all about, I just follow rules a bit too literally without understanding what they are for!"

Er, well, I guess that's a bit long winded for a firework.

Re:This is what we're talking about

[plunge]

I guess you better leave America then, unless you agree with every single bill passed, ever, including the ones that contradict each other.

And, in addition, not all Christian churches believe as a matter of doctrine that zygotes are little tiny people screaming out for protection with their cytoplasm mouths.

Re:This is what we're talking about

[azuravian]

I agree it does seem like a waste. My brother-in-law (moderate republican) and I (left of center Libertarian) had a debate about this recently, and he made one good argument. The concern (coming from those who would seek to make abortion illegal) is this: We use the stem cells that we already have due to abortions being legal. Then years from now if a bill is on the table to make it illegal, we have setup a roadblock against it. What??? Illegalize abortion and lose all those great stem cells that have been doing so much for us.

Personally, I have realized that abortion for the forseeable future will remain legal, so I agree with you. Let's use what we've got.

Re:This is what we're talking about

[MonsoonDawn]

Oh bullshit. Governments are made of people. All governments act according to a moral code. The best governments act according to a code dictated by the citizens. Bad governments operate on a code dictated by very few powerful people or in the worst cases one person.

Re:This is what we're talking about

[hoeferbe]

CRCulver wrote:

If embryos are considered human beings, which at least according to statistics of religious affiliation...

"Consideration" and "belief" shouldn't enter into the discussion. It is an objective fact that embryos are human beings. One needs only look at the embryo's genetic make up.

Deciding if embryos are human or not via statistics of beliefs or opinion polls of the populace is subjective to the whims of the day. It is like 1850's United States southern farmers `deciding` if blacks were people or 1930's German citizens `deciding` if non-Aryan peoples were sub-human.

Re:This is what we're talking about

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Do you really believe "The government has no business legislating [moral codes]"?

I firmly believe this. The government should be about enforcing agreed upon ethics that result in a conflict between individuals, not about morals.

Does that mean that you won't care if someone...

There is a difference between "caring" and thinking it is the government's job.

...kidnaps your children,

Common ethics says children need to be protected until they mature. If one individual tries to violate that ethical rule and in so doing violates the agreed upon ethical rights of others, then it is the government's responsibility to arbitrate the dispute.

hacks into your back accounts and empties them out, steals your car, and backs a moving van up to your home and empties it?

Common ethical rules say a person can make, trade for, and own possessions and taking those without permission violates that right. Again this is an ethical rule, not a moral one and suitable for government intervention.

Some people believe that the government's job is to help protect its people--all its people, including the unborn.

The problem here, is the reasoning behind classifying something as a person. If I claim toasters are people and need to be protected from being dismantled, I need to have a logical argument for why a toaster fits the definition of being a person, within that ethical framework. If my justification for this is, "god told me so" it becomes a religious/moral issue, rather than an ethical one. I agree it is the government's place to intervene and protect the life of all people, but only according to logical and ethical definitions of what a person is, not religious ones.

Abortion and creating embryos (human lives) for the purpose of using their parts are morally wrong and the government would be remiss in not prohibiting them.

Morally wrong according to religious rules or not, the government must look to ethics. I've yet to see a definition of human life that places value upon it for logical and ethical reasons instead of religious ones. Arguing that a bundle of cells has an "invisible, undetectable soul" which needs to be protected is religion, not ethics. There is no logical or evidentiary support for it. It is demonstrable that they do not have brains or conscious thought or any other criteria that make them more worthy of protection than sperm or skin cells, which do not enjoy protection under ethical guidelines.

If you feel each stem cell or embryo has a soul and your god has doomed most of them to a natural death, but it is your religious duty to keep as many alive as possible, I have no problem with that. But the government has no more justification for trying to enforce that religious belief than it does for my religious prohibition on the disassembly of toasters. If you have a religious belief, feel free to adhere to it and even encourage others to via persuasion. Do not, however, think that you are justified in forcing others to comply with your religious beliefs. In fact, the teachings of Jesus implicitly forbid trying to enforce your interpretation of right and wrong on others, while he is somewhat less forthcoming on the topic of stem cell research.

Re:This is what we're talking about

[ArikTheRed]

So you don't believe stealing is a matter of morality? Then why does the government regulate ownership? Because people have realized that stealing is morally wrong and unacceptable. People have a moral right to retain their property without interference.

Wow. Maybe that's the problem with modern government... people like you have no idea why it exists, and bend it to unintended consequences.

Stealing is socially unfeasible. Its morality is incidental. Enforcing codes of ownership is a primary function of government, that's why they do it, not becuase of abstract moral codes. I personally don't want government to exist to force my morals on the population, because I don't really care about the 'population'. I want a government to protect me, protect my friends, and protect my right to own stuff. Despite the high-minded mis-ideals of fools, this is what most people want (which is why they form governments). When your stuff is stolen, you'll right right to the police. What will you tell them? Someone did something immoral? Yeah right, you'll want you stuff back, and then want revenge (read: jailtime) on the perpetrator.

Back to the unfeasibility. For example: No one would buy land if there was no enforcement of ownership (and by extension, enforcement of life). It's just easier to buy guns, kill the previous owners, and move in. Regulation of ownership is precicely what allows modern life to exist. If no government existed, people would form "home associations" to protect large groupings of property (honestly, who wants to stand watch 24/7 to ensure their house doesn't get invaded?). Perhaps these people would rotate responsibilities for protection of the larger group (such as, manning the machine gun turret perimeter around the neighborhood?), so the rest could spend their time doing other things. Some people would not want to do "protection duty" at all, some would prefer to do protection all the time. Hey! I have an idea! Let's pay a small fraction of the group to protect us all the time, and we can spend our time doing other things! Right, there you go. That's the government. And just to ensure there are no competing "security groups", there can be only one. So, in a nutshell, government must have a monopoly on violence. If you notice, nowhere did I mention anything about morality. Thats because, as I stated before, government regulates ownership, not morality.

Re:This is what we're talking about

[ElleyKitten]

Wow, someone's touchy.

It's short for a woman's right to choose what she does with her own body. That's kinda long, so we shorten it.

Say stupid shit like you support my right to choose if I get a tattoo or not all you want. Sorry, but my choices over my body are not limited to what you like and what you don't. I don't tell men what to do with their bodies, don't tell me what to do with mine.

Re:This is what we're talking about

[KingPrad]

Your extreme argument has no relevance to the discussion. You are talking about acts that injure other people. The parent poster was talking about personal actions that affect no one else. Maybe it disgusts some people, but it doesn't hurt anyone. He wasn't talking about absolute freedom of action. Did you really think that is was he was saying?

Embryonic?

[Anonymous Coward]

Umm article says stem cells, halfway down they are talking about embroynic stemcells.

which ones did they use to help the rats walk.

stem cells are legal to use.

embroynic stem cells can be used but require private funding.

article doesn't distinguish wich ones are used on the rodents :(

Re:Embryonic?

[aardwolf64]

There is nothing illegal about using embryonic RAT stem cells...

Miracle

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't be silly. Jesus cured those rats, and He would have cured even more of them if those godless scientists hadn't been mucking about with evil stem cells...

soup of nerve-friendly chemicals

[losec]

thats what i'm going to call long island ice tea from now on.

Actually

[Shivetya]

getting the government out of the way has opened more doors.

many don't realize the numbers of restrictions and amounts of red tape that come with government funding. So while the motive for limiting federal participation in stem cells may be political/religous/etc in basis it does also follow the theme of letting private industry take the risks and reap the rewards.

making people well is big business but along with that comes great cost and time. Innovations come from those who are not bound by restrictions and having the government looking over one's shoulder.

look at it this way, with private entities doing the work, competeing with each other, we will may end up with different cures for the same problems allowing a broader range of people to benefit. we also have multiple avenues to not being impacted in the future by the government agencies as the work was performed in the free market.

Re:Actually

[oh_my_080980980]

I want to nominate you for Twit of the Year Award.

It has been demonstrated time and time again that Big Business is not in the habit of taking risks. They would rather tweak an existing drug, repackage it and bingo we have another anti-histamine (Claritin-D). If you have done the research you will know that the big cures have NOT been happening. That drug companies have dumped more money into advertising than R&D. The bottom line, government funding is necessary for BASIC RESEARCH. Basic Research is very necessary but is not necessarily profitable. Thus a company operating on bottom line principles - which is all of them - will not TAKE RISKS.

What is needed is less politics in government funding. NIH and the NSF are setup to do just that - hand out grants based on merits of the research not the politics. Tell all the tree-hugging hippies, that includes the religious conservatives, to go home!

Re:Actually

[misleb]

look at it this way, with private entities doing the work, competeing with each other, we will may end up with different cures for the same problems allowing a broader range of people to benefit.

See, the problem with that is private entities are quite often not interested in finding cures. More than anything, they try to come up with long term treatments that will bring in recurring profits from each and every user over the lifetime of their patent. Privatization is not the answer to everything. I'd almost rather entrust research to entities whose only motivation is prestige. Treatments are good. Cures are better... and not just for the people, but also for the prestige.

-matthew

I for one

[Anonymous Coward]

Welcome our recently unparalyzed rat overlords.

Geeze

[TheSkepticalOptimist]

I wish I could be a rat, they can cure paralysis, aids, being overweight, being underweight, many types of cancer, mood disorders, aggression, lots of diseases and I even think baldness.

Groups like Peta think that rats are abused in laboratories, but they don't realize how easy a life they have it. Scientists are curing all sorts of problems in rats, making it easier for rats to survive. Billions of dollars are spent every year to cure rat problems.

I just wish that scientists would start curing stuff in humans, it would be nice if one of these days they started applying these discoveries on humans and maybe helping the human race out. If they could just take some of those billions spent on rat research and put it towards humans, what a wonderful world it would be.

So, hurray, scientists cure something else in some lab rat! Let me know when they start working on humans.

This could be crucial to the stem cell debate

[99luftballon]

If they can get a similar process in place for humans it'll cut the legs out from under the luddites opposing stem cell research (no pun intended). It's amazing how many people will decide the ethics of stem cell research aren't that much of a problem when they have the chance to see loved ones walk again, or recover from illnesses like Alzheimer's or Parkinson's.

Re:This could be crucial to the stem cell debate

[bizzynut]

"If they can get a similar process in place for humans it'll cut the legs out from under the luddites opposing stem cell research"

We are talking about embryonic stem cell research,and it wouldn't change my viewpoint to have a cure for myself or a loved one dangled in front of me. Some of those "luddites" are not expressing an irrational fear of technology, but a set of deep-seated values.

University of Louisville method

[jbeaupre]

I like this approach better: http://www.courier-journal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/artic le?AID=/20060308/NEWS01/60308003

I've met these folks. They are getting great results with procedure that is easy to duplicate AND the method uses the patient's own cells. Not only does that avoid the pesky ethics issues, there's no tissue rejection issues.

Yes, but what goes around comes around...

[Flyboy210]

If something like this research was to get into the mainstream, it could definately fix some things that have been bothering the human race for at least a good deal of it's life span. But we also have to think of who this would benefit. Sure, if we can get around the political and legal and moral bullshit that all the "Animal Rights" people, Puritans, and the political puppets who listen to them, and get a thing like this out into the public to cure, can we simply deny giving it to the aforementioned people?

"Please, please help! I lost use of my legs after an accident freeing some lab fruit flys and burning down abortion clinics!"
"Well, then you will not get any of the product that you tried to get rid of. Have fun!"

Can we honestly and morally do that?

What we are talking about is Cells!

[Freedom451]

Not people.

The religious rightists are killing real people with this "moral code" that blocks desperately needed medical research for cures for terrible diseases. It is not a secular moral code of any sort, it is simply a purely religious belief that a soul is created in the human egg cell when a human sperm cell enters it.

These cells are created and expired all the time in fertility clinics, the religious rightists would prefer that these cells be thrown in the trash rather be used to help cure disease.

There is no basis for the rightists assignation of human being status to these cells other than their particular religious belief in the timing of soul creation. Restricting federal funding based on this religious belief is the establishment of religion, anyone who has sworn to uphold the US Constitution should be dismissed for enforcing this religious belief in the United States.

The "innocent people" in the moral equation are the ones with diseases who are being denied cures due to the beliefs of the religious fundamentalists.

title

[helfom]

Stem cells cure(noun) paralyzed(verb) rats
My god! stem cells are worse than we thought!

Stem cells cure(verb) paralyzed(adj) rats
Oh, nevermind...

Re:I once saw...

[Fred_A]

The most likely scenario is that she ran her dog over with that electric wheelchair...

That one *almost* makes sense

[Beryllium Sphere(tm)]

One of the (many) obstacles to making this work has been the problem of getting through the tough, thick wall of scar tissue that the body builds around the injury site.

So there is a physical wall involved, rather than a metaphorical one.

Though the word "literally" does conjure up a picture of bricks in someone's spine.

It is not a "judgement call"

[Freedom451]

to say a mass of undifferentiated cells are not a human being. It is a clear scientific demarcation. A bit of cells from my arm are not a human being, a cancer cell (which has unique DNA) is not a human being. Fertilized eggs have no potential unless implanted into a mother's womb.

They are routinely discarded by fertility clinics, this is an established practice with established laws surronding it.

Various things are opposed by all sorts of fringe groups. The only group of anti-stem cell research advocates that has any large membership and ability buy votes are the ones who believe the fertilized egg has a soul. If not for this group, the research would proceed apace.

The only real opposition is religious, not scientific. Medical scientists are the ones best positioned to judge whether research has medical potential, not religious groups. The NIH assembles teams of expert researchers to judege whether a proposed avenue of research is worth spending money on, only with stem cells this process is poluted with arbitrary limits, which are based on purely religious beliefs.

At least be honest about your motivations: you want to impose your beliefs on the time of soul creation on eveyone else, and you don't care a bit if valuable research is blocked due to your imposition, and people die or lead needlessly limited lives because of it (which Christian Fundamentalists* rationalize by believing that a short life of pain is followed by eternity of pleasure in paradies--for those who prove themselves worthy by imposing their beliefs on anyone they can't convert).

Human Clinical Trial

[Bones3D_mac]

They're already working to get human clinical trials (bottom of the page) going on this. I'm strongly considering being a test subject for it if they can get a site set up near my area.

Considering how things are currently going in the US though, this could end up being the only chance many of us will have for getting this sort of treatment any time soon. Eventually, some self-righteous asshat is going to propose federal bans on this, forcing those of us suffering from this type of condition to either live with the problem as-is, or leave the country and pay for it out of pocket.

Re:Also works as a gender change medicine!

[Golias]

From the latin, "gender" is based on the word "genus" or origin. It's only fairly recently that the word has come to refer to sexual identity.

However, it's not common to use the word to distinguish between species. I think the original poster's point was joking that if you could turn a mouse into a rat (as the original headline error implied), you could probably change a woman into a man. (of vice versa.)

The thing is, gene-splicing sex changes are probably not that far down the road. Figure out just the right hormone and chemical signals to send to stem cells (adult or embrionic) and you could probably grow an entire uterus for an adult male. It's probably too late, in an adult, to turn the testicles into ovaries, but it might someday be possible to simply replace them with new ovaries grown from the patient's own DNA.

Answer: yes

[brian0918]

"The question is, is there a way to please environmentalists and animal rights activists?"

That's easy. Take your pick:

A. Kill off the entire human species.
B. All of the above.