Skin Stem Cells Used to Mend Spines of Rats

The Toronto Star reports researchers have used adult skin stem cells to heal spinal cord injuries in rats. "Injured rats injected with skin-derived stem cells regained mobility and had better walking co-ordination, according to the study published yesterday in the Journal of Neuroscience. The skin-derived stem cells, injected directly into the injured rats' spinal cords, were able to survive in their new location and set off a flurry of activity, helping to heal the cavity in the cord."

Comments

very nice

[Anonymous Coward]

can we enlarge my penis now with this technique?

Re:very nice

[DragonTHC]

no, but your penis will be able to walk again.

Re:very nice

[Wonko the Sane]

can we enlarge my penis now with this technique?

The first time this happens, I predict federal funding of stem cell research to be approved by congress within 24 hours.

Re:very nice

[tloh]

..... approved by congress within 24 hours. But didn't Bob Dole quit congress when he lost his presidential election bid? ....Unless some other legislator I didn't know about has now come out with improving sexual experience as a personal crusade.

Re:very nice

[jollyreaper]

The first time this happens, I predict federal funding of stem cell research to be approved by congress within 24 hours. Tell them you can cure a case of the gays with stem cells and the funding will be showering you like a schoolgirl in a bukkake video.

Re:very nice

[Archangel Michael]

(ex)Senator Craig is now trying to claim his bathroom stunt was "research".

Senator Clinton was heard mumbling something about interns .... and reversing her view on national health care system.

Re:very nice

[Marxist Hacker 42]

Federal funding of adult stem cell research already exists. It's the embryonic stem cell research that is forbidden in the United States; and despite being legal in other countries, has yet to achieve even ONE useful cure. Where Adult Stem Cells, like in TFA, are now up to 20 or 30 miracle cures of a variety of injuries from heart attacks to severed spine paralysis. One ASC researcher has even claimed that he can regenerate 30,000 human brains from a single Grey matter stem cell (though, one would suspect that any knowledge the donor had would not be so duplicated- after all growing nervous tissue does not create the connections between those nerves).

Re:very nice

[Penguinshit]

http://www.alsa.org/research/article.cfm?id=1155&C FID=4087183&CFTOKEN=75996565

Re:very nice

[Pentavirate]

It's the embryonic stem cell research that is forbidden in the United States

One little difference from what you said. Embryonic stem cell research is not forbidden in the United States. The federal government just won't fund it except from a couple of pre-existing stem cell lines (which I guess are corrupted and worthless now anyway). Lot's of embryonic stem cell research happens via private funds and is often even funded through states like California.

Everything else you said is spot on.

Re:very nice

[Marxist Hacker 42]

Interesting, but not quite the same thing, since you can also use adult stem cells to make GDNF. Also note it wasn't a cure- it didn't delay onset of symptoms since the surviving motor neurons also lost their connections to muscle tissue.

In addition to that, this isn't a typical stem cell therapy, where you replace damaged tissue with stem cell grown tissue of the same type. This is something altogether different- if you had a bacteria you had engineered to produce GDNF, you'd end up with EXACTLY the same effect.

Re:very nice

[Clandestine_Blaze]

can we enlarge my penis now with this technique?

The first time this happens, I predict federal funding of stem cell research to be approved by congress within 24 hours. Naw, it'll face stiff resistance from the White House.

Re:very nice

[Anonymous Coward]

no, but your penis will be able to walk again. Who wants that?! Our penises already have too much control over where we go.

Re:very nice

[Anonymous Coward]

Schoolgirls shower onto things in bukkake videos?! Or does funding shower onto schoolgirls in bukkake videos?! "Funding", eh? You kids these days...

Re:very nice

[tloh]

Who cares what congress does? In Soviet Russia, rats break YOUR spine!

dude, what happened to my meds?

Re:very nice

[Anonymous Coward]

I wouldn't mind federal funding of stem-cell research; if they harvested the cells from illegal beaners.

Re:very nice

[bensafrickingenius]

Another interesting point -- George W. Bush is the only president ever to provide any funding for embryonic stem cell research. Ever. And yet he gets his ass kicked for not expanding the funding to cover more cell lines.

Re:very nice

[Pingmaster]

can we enlarge my penis now with this technique? The first time this happens, I predict federal funding of stem cell research to be approved by congress within 24 hours.
And I predict that due to your comment, we will now be seeing spam for penis enlargement stem cell pills by Monday..

Re:very nice

[PhoenixAtlantios]

I don't want to throw this thread too far off topic, but that poses an interesting question:

Say you've known what your sexuality is for at least 10-15 years and have no problem with it, would you take a 'cure' to alter it if someone invented one? It's similar to that question posed in X-3 (god awful movie though) about the mutants and their 'cure' for the abnormal, would you 'cure' your abnormality and in turn remove a part who you are?

Re:very nice

[Anonymous Coward]

I have no problem with ESC being banned as they are in Ireland mainly due to the controversy. Why use something so controvercial when an alternative, which as you say, is have proven to be more useful, is available? Yes, some people say that ESC can cure more things but if something a lot easier to obtain is readily available and is not going to cause riots with the uneducated masses, why bother?

I would love to see a poll between the USA and UK through the general population and see how many people actually know the difference between ASC and ESC.

Re:very nice

[Marxist Hacker 42]

I would love to see a poll between the USA and UK through the general population and see how many people actually know the difference between ASC and ESC.

I would too. I'd especially like to see it broken down by denomination or sect. I strongly suspect that the more zealous the sect, the less tendency there is to know the difference. This goes for strong atheists and Unitarian Universalists who'd like to see both ASC and ESC legalized, just as much as it goes for the fundamentalist Christian pro-life movement who claims about "Stem Cell Research" without making the distinction.

Re:very nice

[et764]

I'd mod you up if I had mod points. I get so tired of hearing about "Bush's ban on stem cell research," because the thing truly does not exist.

I say.

[Hsensei]

It has never been a better time to be a rat. no cancer or diabetes and now no paralasys.

Re:I say.

[Chris Burke]

It has never been a better time to be a rat. no cancer or diabetes and now no paralasys.

Except for the part where they first give you cancer, diabetes, and paralysis.

Re:I say.

[GeckoX]

And then you're only given a 50% chance of not being in the control group.

And that's still only beneficial if you're in the test group for the particular drug or therapy that actually works!

And even if you are that lucky, there's a more than probable chance that your reward for surviving all of that and getting 'cured', will be to be euthanized shortly thereafter.

Odds...they are not good for a lab rat.

Re:I say.

[Adriax]

Except for the part where they first give you cancer, diabetes, and paralysis.
 
Except, according to california law EVERYTHING causes cancer. So for all we know these rats were fed chocolate coated alaskan cod till their backs gave out.

Re:I say.

[driftingwalrus]

But it's hard to beat the rate on prescription drugs:)

Whew

[HangingChad]

If my rat ever breaks his back I'll know just what to do.

Lab Rats

[Perl-Pusher]

If humans were rats we would have cured all major illnesses by now. It seems everyday I read something that we have been able to cure or cause in rats. Unfortunately progress on humans has been much slower.

Re:Lab Rats

[iamacat]

Indicating that we need an informed human volunteer program. We ask people to risk their lives at war in another country, surely taking some risks to help millions in your own country is not out of the question? I would think risky experiments would be limited to those who stand to benefit from them or terminally ill who want to end their life on a meaningful note.

Re:Lab Rats

[AvitarX]

Is it much slower?

Or 10 years + FDA approval behind?

Also, adult stem cells in salamanders can be used to regrow legs.

Re:Lab Rats

[BlowHole666]

Naw just take people who are sentenced to death and practice stuff on them. It is a win win, the human race can learn something new and they don't have to wait.

Re:Lab Rats

[Penguinshit]

Stem Cell Strategy Shows Challenges for ALS

Re:Lab Rats

[shaitand]

'human volunteer program'

The program should be voluntary but I see no reason it should have to be gratis. Pay top yen and conduct the experiments on female children in China. It's a win/win.

Re:Lab Rats

[geekoid]

There are process for doing just that. I forget the name.

Needless to say, it is a very complicated issue, and success in rats is a very good thing, but there are many more tests that need to be performed before it is ready for even the most basic human testing.
There have been many treatments and cures for mice that failed for a variety of reason before human testing.

Re:Lab Rats

[milamber3]

This already happens for quite a few diseases. Look at Stem Cells Inc. and their work with Batten's Disease. These children are going to die if nothing is done so they are doing approved trial with them. The problem with using the people who are most ill is that sometimes they die before you get all the information you need from the trial. Trials are expensive and time consuming already so that's a pretty big negative to overcome.

Re:Lab Rats

[tloh]

If humans were rats we would have cured all major illnesses by now.

Yes, but you would be a tiny part of a semi-formal, well-established, institutionalized breeding program. Your relatives would be your parents, siblings and cousins all at the same time due to inbreeding. You and your fellow rats would have been carefully designed genetically to custom physiological specifications so as to make experimenting easy and meaningful. Like for example, you would have no immune system so that foreign cells can be incubated inside your body without suffering tissue rejection issues. Or you would be genetically predisposed to some congenital disease so that drugs can be tested on you for effectiveness.

I say all this in jest, of course. It is important to realize that success with rats are accomplished only with the benefit of an incredible ammount of control excercised by researchers that translate very poorly to the realistic world human beings are living in. Beyond these initial animal trials, there are still an incredible number of hoops that medical researchers have to jump through before they can come up with something that is injectable into you.

Re:Lab Rats

[Anonymous Coward]

I hear there's a place called Gitmo full of likely specimens.

Re:Lab Rats

[rucs_hack]

terminally ill who want to end their life on a meaningful note

They already do that. I had a friend who was diagnosed with a very nasty cancer that killed him in four months. Unfortunately his 'doctors' convinced him to allow them to test a drug on him. It helped him not a jot, a fact that they alluded to being likely (being of medical background I could read between the lines of what he was told), but never quite managed to explain clearly for him, and made him puke constantly. I did try to convince him to not take part, but they'd got him on the 'for the good of other people' thing. His was not the first case I encountered where this had occured, just the closest to me.

Terminally ill people make bad subjects. For one thing they're already dying, so your looking at a system in a failure condition, not much useful general data to be had there, and we are, after all, dealing with a person who may want to be doing other stuff in their last bit of time alive. They are also prone to being fragile of mind (not always, but it can happen in those who suddenly find they are dying young), so susceptible to being talked into things not in their best interests.

I'm against it, you may have gathered. Personally I think we should be growing brainless human bodies (as in never had a brain, never alive without external help), and test on them instead. Heck, we might even be able to cuts bits off them for people to use.

Re:Lab Rats

[iamacat]

Well, you are against it but shouldn't the decision be left to each individual? Maybe your friend concluded that he would rather help others than do "other stuff" with his remaining time. Someone about to die would probably puke a lot anyway.

I am not prepared to intentionally create mutilated human bodies. Lets wait until we can grow individual organs. A kidney floating in nutrient solution doesn't seem too human.

Re:Lab Rats

[Anonymous Coward]

As long as Scarlett Johansson can be the first to be duplicated.

Re:Lab Rats

[notclevernickname]

Considering that in the U.S. alone, nearly two-thirds of all capital convictions are overturned, I don't think that is a very good idea. Also, there are about 3,000 inmates on death row right now, I'm pretty sure thats not enough for all of the medical procedures that are being developed today.

Re:Lab Rats

[xappax]

But then of course the problem is that many of the test subjects may die before they can collect their payment. Solution: instead of buying the services of the child, simply buy the child itself outright from its parents. This would also allow the experimenters greater freedom in terms of how they treat and store their subjects, since the child would be their property and not entitled to inconveniences like "humane treatment".

Enrich third world parents, and advance first world medicine at the same time...I see a golden age of science on the horizon!

Re:Lab Rats

[Tribbin]

I agree with you.

We experiment on people so we can cure rats.

Re:Lab Rats

[Anonymous Coward]

And a kidney grown in nutrient solution would also be useless for truly testing efficacy or side effects.
So you're hung up on the container rather than what truly makes us human?

I wouldn't call a body grown without a brain a mutilated human. I'd consider it a body "sans human"
Heck, nothing is cut up so you're technically wrong on phrasing, just using a loaded word.

And, yes, I'm aware of the argument that that the body is critical to being human due to unique input of senses and hormones. I'm also of opinion we'll get to point soon where we'll be able to duplicate those and still have the brain in a jar type thing.

Re:Lab Rats

[ceoyoyo]

We're a wee bit more careful when experimenting on humans.

Re:Lab Rats

[vimh42]

"I think we should be growing brainless human bodies"

So what your saying is that you think we should test the general population, elected officials? Or are you saying we should grow zombies? Think of the possibility for the theatre? Undead marionettes! Look out Shakespeare!

Re:Lab Rats

[shaitand]

'But then of course the problem is that many of the test subjects may die before they can collect their payment.'

The payments go to the parents (if subject is under age) or whomever the subject chooses as next of kin (if of age). That is what would motivate desperate people to participate.

'Solution: instead of buying the services of the child, simply buy the child itself outright from its parents.'

Shame on you, that would be slavery and unethical. The child would be used without consent in a case like that. It isn't our fault if the potential subject is a child and it falls on a parent to decide what is in their interest. That is standard practice here in the first world as well after all. Parents happily partake in cementing the minds of their children and stunting their growth by keeping them as ignorant human dolls for as long as possible.

'Enrich third world parents, and advance first world medicine at the same time...I see a golden age of science on the horizon!'

Yes :)

Re:Lab Rats

[Anonymous Coward]

I think we should be growing brainless human bodies (as in never had a brain, never alive without external help), and test on them instead. Better than a rat for almost everything, but I'm pretty sure the brain is an important part of the whole system. Drugs have possibly permanent mood or awareness side-effects that wouldn't register on a meat-puppet guinea pig (mixed metaphor sorry).

Re:Lab Rats

[driftingwalrus]

It's hardly mutilated. The body would have born acephalic. It's a question of genetics. There isn't much difference between genetically engineering a race of acephalic humans for medical purposes and aborting a fetus. A proper fetus even has a brain and the potential to be a fully functional human, the acephalic creations would never have this and would be human in name only.

Re:Lab Rats

[iamacat]

It will not be acephalic. You need hypothalamus and limbic system just to allow the body to survive until it has adult-sized organs. Basic motor control is probably necessary to prevent atrophy of almost everything because of 18 years of inactivity. Once you get to this level of functioning a) you could claim that there is elementary continuousness and b) some morons will have sex with those bodies and create half-brainless children.

Re:Lab Rats

[nemoyspruce]

I'm against it, you may have gathered. Personally I think we should be growing brainless human bodies (as in never had a brain, never alive without external help), and test on them instead. Heck, we might even be able to cuts bits off them for people to use.

If we could grow brainless human bodies, why not just transplant our brains onto them so we dont have to worry about disease anymore.

Re:Lab Rats

[wealthychef]

some morons will have sex with those bodies and create half-brainless children

The first thing you learn in genetics is that it is not blended. A brainless person mated with a person with a brain will not create a person with half a brain.

Re:Lab Rats

[Anonymous Coward]

I say use the ones that are proven guilty beyond doubt, and all appeals have been exhausted. At least some good could come out of those evil b@st@rds!

Re:Lab Rats

[Anonymous Coward]

How the hell could you claim breathing constitutes elementary consciousness?
If having a functioning lymbic system was the standard, many cases of "brain death" disconnects would be murder.

Re:Lab Rats

[rucs_hack]

Many processes in the human body are dealt with by the part of the brain that sits in the spine, or the 'lower' brain that has nothing to do with consciousness.

Those could be included and still avoid having a sentient person.

Re:Lab Rats

[tiqui]

This is not as far out as you might imagine. There is a tradition in the U.S. in which, during wartime when the draft existed (during WWII, Korean War, etc.) conscientious objectors volunteered to provide benefit to their country by being subjects in medical tests. These people deserve a great deal of respect for being willing to take risks as big as their brothers faced in battle while still being consistent with their values. Also, these people were of far greater value than subjects who might be terminally ill, or criminals because they were both healthy and cooperative. Many but not all were Seventh Day Adventists, I believe others were Mennonites and possibly Amish. I am not a member of any of these groups, but I greatly respect this type of conscientious objector.

For those who may be interested, there were a number of groups and programs involved and I'm sure any Slashdot readers can do their own searches, but the following links may lead you to more info:

http://www.brfwitness.org/Articles/2005v40n1.htm (see item 3a on this page)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Whitecoat

http://www.themennonite.org/issues/10-12/article s/Corn_oil_and_skim_milk

http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/bioterrorism /2001-12-20-whitecoat-usat.htm

http://www.armymedicine.army.mil/news/releases/2 0050318research.cfm?m=3&y=2005

Re:Lab Rats

[iamacat]

The first thing you learn after actually having children is that a lot of parents' characteristics are blended. But if the offspring is healthy but has 50% chance to have a brainless baby or is viable but has severe mental retardation, is it really much better?

Re:Lab Rats

[Yoozer]

Shame on you, that would be slavery and unethical.

And having the parents kill her because she isn't the boy they planned to have (and the one-child-per-family policy) isn't?

Re:Lab Rats

[iamacat]

Even fully conscious humans should be permitted to end their lives with dignity if they have no prospects of meaningful, enjoyable existence. This doesn't justify creating terminally ill or brain dead humans intentionally. While the later case is perhaps not a murder, is it ethical/tasteful enough to fund such research with tax money or allow people doing it to keep their medical license?

Lymbic system allows you to get a hardon. Who is to say that it's not enjoyable on some primitive, animal level?

Re:Lab Rats

[Anonymous Coward]

Because enjoying or suffering requires consciousness.
"primitive animal level"
Might as well claim a robot with an inflatable dildo circuit attached is enjoying you jacking it off.

As for tax money. Nope. Shouldn't be funded.
But I'd say that of all research. Is mixing of government funding with private that got us into the stem cell mess. But banned, absolutely not. Just because some people have hangups on the container doesn't mean they get to dictate what lifesaving research takes place.
Heck, I wouldn't even say your attitude should prevent you from benefiting from the research, just like I feel those PETA nuts should still get insulin.

Re:Lab Rats

[reversecausality]

You can blame the Nazis for that - it's become very difficult to get permission to experiment on the disabled since WWII. Even if you ask them first.

Re:Lab Rats

[xappax]

Shame on you, that would be slavery and unethical.

Wait, "ethical"? I thought we were talking about the free market, and the glories of unregulated capitalism...

The genius of high-minded science married to the moral apathy of insatiable greed: with a winning combination like that, who needs ethics?

Re:Lab Rats

[driftingwalrus]

Sounds like a whole new Real Doll business in some respects. Hmm, now I need to look up brain in ancient greek...

Re:Lab Rats

[shaitand]

'And having the parents kill her because she isn't the boy they planned to have (and the one-child-per-family policy) isn't?'

Maybe it is unethical of the parents to consent but that is between them, their code of imaginary rules called morality, their mythical deity of choice, and their child. There is nothing unethical about experimenting with informed and consenting volunteers however and when it comes to children consent comes from parents.

As far as the one child per family policy and killing off girls in favor of boys that is for their society/government to decide, not outsiders in a different culture with different values. The thing you have to remember about cultures and values is that they are arbitrary, there is no absolute right or wrong only adopted codes of behavior. People have different reasons for adopting such codes, for example (in order of sanity) logic suggests rules to allow humans to co-exist in a peaceful manner, they are the behaviors of a role model, or an old book says a magical and invisible man who can't be tested or questioned says to do it.

Re:Lab Rats

[Yoozer]

The thing you have to remember about cultures and values is that they are arbitrary, there is no absolute right or wrong only adopted codes of behavior.

I know relativism is cool and all that, but let me give you a swift kick in the nuts (a Slashdot cultural assumption) and I'm rather certain that you're going to tell me that it is absolutely wrong ;)

The idea of population planning isn't that objectionable per se, but leaving the details and implementation to the people themselves isn't such a great idea. Girls get killed after birth instead of earlier where it'd at least be less traumatic for the mother, and the government should realize the problem of a region (mostly rural, I think) ending up with a lot of pampered boys unable to find a wife.

Re:Lab Rats

[shaitand]

'The idea of population planning isn't that objectionable per se, but leaving the details and implementation to the people themselves isn't such a great idea. Girls get killed after birth instead of earlier where it'd at least be less traumatic for the mother, and the government should realize the problem of a region (mostly rural, I think) ending up with a lot of pampered boys unable to find a wife.'

You might be right. But as I already said...

'As far as the one child per family policy and killing off girls in favor of boys that is for their society/government to decide, not outsiders in a different culture with different values.'

It's really not our problem. I really fail to see how what you said gives me a 'swift kick in the nuts' or takes the wind from my sails. The whole population control scheme is irrelevant to what I'm saying.

Weekend Update

[XxtraLarGe]

I remember seeing SNL where the were talking about a story similar to this about a decade ago. Norm McDonald said "Well that's good news, hey? Get those rats up and around again!"

OK I'm confused.

[sakusha]

This makes no sense to me. I remember a long time ago (maybe 1976) when I was a pre-med student in college, I got a part time job at the hospital's Anaesthesiology Lab. Some of the doctors were always doing research on lab rats, it was my job to assist them (mostly doing computer data analysis). One day I saw a doctor doing some particularly nasty stuff to some rats, I asked him what he was doing. He said he was severing their spinal cords. I asked him why he was doing that. He told me that rats have a unique ability to partially repair their spinal cord even if it was completely severed. Then he showed me how he did it (not that I really wanted to see it). He made a little slice, a little snip, and crudely sewed the rat back up. I asked him why he didn't put some antibiotics in the wound or anything. He said, "well they're just rats." Sheesh. That was about the time I decided I didn't want to be a doctor.

So anyway, I was under the impression that rats already had the ability to repair their spinal cord even without the use of stem cells. Perhaps I've mis-remembered what the doctor/researcher said, does anyone know the details?

Re:OK I'm confused.

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, the nervous systems of animals differ tremendously. For instance, certain types of damage on nerves in humans can render the individual immobile, but barely affect an animal. Even though I don't know about the rats' mystical spine-regeneration ability, it surely is a creature that is expected to get more damage to its spine than us humans.

But I guess the key-point in the summary was _helped_ to recover.

Re:OK I'm confused.

[notclevernickname]

While TFA doesn't specifically give evidence for your anecdote, it does mention that "Injured rats injected with skin-derived stem cells regained mobility and had better walking co-ordination..." which seems to imply that the rats without the stem cell treatment did partially repair themselves, but the rats treated with stem cells healed better.

Re:OK I'm confused.

[Colin Smith]

http://www.rds-online.org.uk/pages/page.asp?i_Page ID=145&i_ToolbarID=3

Apparently if the severance is incomplete they can regrow nerve fibres.

I thought humans could too though. I thought it was the scarring on the ends of the nerve fibres which prevented regrowth. My father severed the nerve in a finger, after several years it regrew and he could feel things again.

Re:OK I'm confused.

[TomorrowPlusX]

I'm not a neuroscientist -- but my girlfriend is. And I've watched her do the exact operation you described for the purpose of making illustrations for her papers ( I'm a graphic designer ). It was Gruesome. Anyway, I don't think it's that rats can heal their spinal cords. They can't. But, like us, they can heal damaged spinal cords up to a particular level of trauma, and since rats are the ubiquitous model for this reasearch, that level of trauma is reasonably well-understood.

So, a lot of this spinal work is done at that approximate trauma level; then when the rats are at different levels of healing they're "sacrificed" ( or "sacked", for short ) and then analysis of the cells at the damage point is done to better understand why that particular trauma level exists, such that ways can be determined to push it farther.

Re:OK I'm confused.

[Anonymous Coward]

further

Re:OK I'm confused.

[sakusha]

I'm not sure I'd describe this procedure as an "operation," more like a mutilation. I recall the researcher completely severing the spinal cord with a scissors, about halfway down the rat's back (but of course I could be wrong, this was 30 years ago and memory fades). I vaguely recall him saying this was just above the point where the nerves that control the hind legs leave the spinal column, this made it easy to assess healing by watching the rat's ability to walk with its hind legs, and at the same time it doesn't affect too many other systems (like it would if they cut at a higher vertebrae).
Anyway, do me a favor and ask your neuro-girlfriend about rats' ability to heal from a complete spinal severance, I'd be interested in her answer.

Re:OK I'm confused.

[poopdeville]

Fuck, I severed a nerve in my finger a few months ago. Cooking accident. It's gonna take years to grow back? FUCK.

Re:OK I'm confused.

[chooks]

Nerve fibers in the peripheral nervous system (PNS - formed by cranial and spinal nerves) have the potential for regrowing. How successful they are at regrowing depends on the type of injury. Apparently the myelin sheaths formed by Schwann cells in the PNS (which, among other things, speed up the nerve signal conduction velocity and decrease metabolic demands on the cell for signalling) can also help the nerve regenerate axons in the case of trauma. If the trauma is a crushing one, then the nerve cell body may have more of a chance of regenerating through the existing myelin sheath infrastructure. If the trauma is a severing variety, then the cell body will send out cellular processes to try to reconnect with its target. This reconnection may or may not be successful. However, it is possible for motor cells that signal to one muscle to re-enervate another muscle (e.g. jaw winking where jaw nerve muscles re-enervate the eye after injury).

Injury to the central nervous system (CNS - spinal cord and brain) is a much different story. Here, the nerves are precluded from reconnecting with their targets to due scar tissue laid down by normally supportive cells (astrocytes). Other supportive cells (oligodendrocytes and microglia cells) may also release inhibitory factors thus preventing CNS regeneration.

Re:OK I'm confused.

[TomorrowPlusX]

I have asked her -- IIRC her answer was that complete severing of the spinal cord has zero recovery.

Agreed about the mutilation bit. She opens up the spinal column, exposes the cord, and then uses a machine like a guillotine ( but with a blunt impactor rather than a blade ) to "bruise" the cord directly. Then she puts the poor rats back together and lets them heal.

She also does it at very particular locations for the purpose of watching the rat's hind legs regain control.

Re:OK I'm confused.

[sakusha]

OK thanks for the followup, that makes sense, I didn't see how complete severing could possibly heal, that's why I wondered about that incident for all these years. I guess technology marches onward, since now you have little guillotines and back then they just used a scissors. I guess they were just partially snipping at the cord with the scissors, not totally severing it.

Canadians?

[Maximum Prophet]

The finding lends promise to the idea that stem cells could one day be used to heal spinal cord injuries in humans, helping thousands of Canadians to walk again.

Is there something about Canadians that makes them more like rats than the rest of us? (or more likely to walk after this treatment?)

Re:Canadians?

[Anonymous Coward]

Only the Quebec'ers.

Re:Canadians?

[notclevernickname]

Or it could be that the article is on a Canadian website that caters to Canadians....

Re:Canadians?

[Anonymous Coward]

No, but I hear they are now using Newfies instead of rats for research because 1) There's more of them 2) You don't get as emotionally attached, and 3) There's some things even a rat won't do!

Re:Canadians?

[GeckoX]

Yes.

And I could tell you what it is, but then I'd have to kill you.

We are going to rule the world after all, ehh. ;)

Re:Canadians?

[Anonymous Coward]

Things like science and fire are not yet illegal in Canada (I'm sure our PM is working on those two issues at this very moment).

Great Alternative to Controversy

[MutualDisdain]

I think it's great that adult stem cell research has been so successful. Also, according to this story: http://www.nature.com/news/2007/070604/full/447618 a.html they can now take skin cells and turn them into embryonic stem cells.

Soon there will be no need to use embryos for stem cell research.

Re:Great Alternative to Controversy

[Rico_Suave]

Interesting how more and more cures and uses for adult stem cells are found, yet some would have you think embryonic stem cells are the only useful ones. Almost as if it's not *really* about finding cures at all... hmmm...

Re:Great Alternative to Controversy

[Anonymous Coward]

Soon there will be no need to use embryos for stem cell research.

But it's no fun unless you get to run babys through a grinder! We really, really need government funding for the baby grinders! Regular hamburger grinders are getting so mundaine.

Re:Great Alternative to Controversy

[Corporate Drone]

I think it's great that adult stem cell research has been so successful. Also, according to this story: http://www.nature.com/news/2007/070604/full/447618 a.html they can now take skin cells and turn them into embryonic stem cells. Soon there will be no need to use embryos for stem cell research.

Somehow, we've so completely bought into the notion that embryonic stem cells are the only ones with promise, that when -- time and again -- we see that the breakthroughs are occurring with adult stem cells, we still want to ignore them and use embryonic stem cells nonetheless.

Here's another link for you: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/09/07090 4114446.htm Researchers at the Children's Hospital in Pittsburgh have found adult stem cells that can repair muscle.

That proves it! We need to open up federal funding for embryonic stem cell research!!!

Re:Great Alternative to Controversy

[Anonymous Coward]

Somehow, people have gotten a crazy notion into their heads: that adult and embryonic stem cells are mutually exclusive. It's like we can only research one and not the other! How absurd.

I've never heard anyone argue that research on adult stem cells should be halted. Yet more than one reply to this post suggests that it's common to believe that embryonic stem cells are the only useful ones to research. Have the anti-research crowd given up trying to argue logically? Are they now going to beat this "one or the other" straw man to death?

For this reason, it appears that the controversy will not end. Even if the embryonic cells don't come from an embryo, the research will be seen as "evil" because it (supposedly) diverts resources from adult stem cell research. But if they're both promising areas of research then they should both be funded, right? It is this little gem of common sense that has never been successfully refuted. It probably never will be refuted, because the opposition seems to be pretending that it doesn't exist.

Re:Great Alternative to Controversy

[Anonymous Coward]

Somehow, people have gotten a crazy notion into their heads: that adult and embryonic stem cells are mutually exclusive. It's like we can only research one and not the other! How absurd. It's called opportunity cost.

Once you've spent a dollar buying Le Big Mac, you can't use that same dollar to buy a Royale with Cheese. And yes, you can buy both burgers, but it'll cost you more money. Plus you'll get fat.

Re:Great Alternative to Controversy

[Anonymous Coward]

You're definitely not getting what I meant by "mutually exclusive". You're talking about the problem of distributing funds over a wide variety of promising areas of research. I'm talking about the belief that one area of research is made entirely obsolete by another. Federal funding already exists for multiple areas of research - this is an issue independent of federal bans on research funding.

You should try the Royale with Cheese sometime. It's good to have some variety in life, and maybe you'll come to like it even more than Le Big Mac! There's no point in stubbornly refusing to try it, what have you got to lose?

Re:Great Alternative to Controversy

[drawfour]

Why can't scientists use BOTH? It's quite possible that embryonic stem cells are better suited in some instances, and adult stem cells are better suited in others. There's no need to use one to the exclusion of the other.

So yes, embryonic stem cells _should_ be opened up to federal funding programs, so that advances can be made w/ either type of stem cell.

Re:Great Alternative to Controversy

[DarthTaco]

"Why can't scientists use BOTH?"

They can. Just not with federal money.

Rats?

[Das Auge]

Personally, I think we should just let the politicians die. But that's just me...

Cerebrospinal applications

[athloi]

Can they make idiots re-grow brains?

Re:Cerebrospinal applications

[Nilych]

What makes you think the idiots won't screw it up the second time around? Something about repeating an action and expecting different results...

Re:Cerebrospinal applications

[MyLongNickName]

Can they make idiots re-grow brains?

When you get back from treatment, let us know.

Re:Cerebrospinal applications

[bazio]

Sorry, no. Unfortunately, this process only works on injured tissue, since the stem cells need to have an example of healthy tissue to emulate. In the case of idiots, it would only create more of the brain they already have, which is clearly useless to them (and society).

The process could be used to create tremendous pressure in the heads of idiots by growing more brain, which would cause a huge headache for them, so maybe they'd stay home and away from the rest of us. I think it would be more economical, though, to sever the spinal cords of idiots, and use them as human subjects for further testing. Possibly as the "placebo" group.

Re:Cerebrospinal applications

[Nephilium]

That's just insanity... we can deal with that...

Nephilium

chinese got there first

[crayz]

Sounds similar to the experimental (human) treatment being practiced in China. There's been a lot of skepticism about why/how such a thing could work, but according to a lot of people who've gone through the treatment it does restore some amount of functionality

Rats and mice

[jbeaupre]

I recall once reading that 1/3 of drugs tested on rats and mice have different effects with each (it may have been toxicity). Even if 1/3 is exaggerated, the point was that extrapolating to humans is even more dicey.

Germany, Austria, Ireland

[Anonymous Coward]

In Germany, Austria, and Ireland, it's illegal to destroy embryos to create stem cell lines.

In Soviet Russia, on the other hand...

"Adult" stem cells

[Anonymous Coward]

Working with "adult" stem cells is a lot like programming in a high-level language. Working with "embryonic" stem cells is a lot like programming in assembly/machine language for a RISC processor. Sure, you can do literally anything in assembly/machine language, and learning the instruction set for a RISC processor is simple since, well it's a small instruction set... but once you've committed to learning how to manipulate a complex high-level language, you can accomplish huge programming tasks much more efficiently than moving individual bytes around one at a time. But learning a complicated high-level language and actually becoming proficient at it, takes a lot of effort.

Re:"Adult" stem cells

[Anonymous Coward]

wow, you know, i read a lot of shitty analogies on slashdot, but wow if that wasn't one of the shittier ones.

better analogy: either case is like programming in a horrifically spaghettified codebase strapped together over decades of virtually random alterations in which you maybe can recognize a few of the basic function calls but fuck all if you know what ninety percent of the goddamn thing is doing much less how to make it do something different without breaking something else. and the only way you get anywhere is through painful, painful, long reverse compilations and changing code to see how it breaks. consider these rats the stack trace of biology.

oh, yes, i am a computational biologist, by the way.

Re:"Adult" stem cells

[Hognoxious]

Yeah, but can you drive a car?

Scarring

[PIPBoy3000]

The other big issue is scarring. Nerves have a really hard time growing through scar tissue. What I was hoping to see in this article is how long the injuries were left untreated. If stem cells were cultivated before the injury and injected before scarring can occur, it's not going to be that helpful in real-life situations.

Adult skin

[Anonymous Coward]

Did anyone else glance at the blurb, see the words "adult skin" and get a little excited only to learn this story has nothing to do with pr0n?

Finally.

[proverbialcow]

At long last, Christopher Reeve will be able to walk again.

What's that you say? Ohhhh...

Re:Finally.

[Anonymous Coward]

The joke's that he's dead, right?

Re:Finally.

[proverbialcow]

The joke's that he's dead, right?

Yes, and you're right - I should apologize to his widow.

What's that you say? Ohhh...

Little guys are saving lives/livelihoods

[Nyktos]

I got a tour of this lab a few months ago. It was totally amazing to see rats at various stages of recovery. Freshly broken backs with nasty looking scar and staples dragging themselves along with their front legs, to near fully recovered rats walking on all fours. Really really amazing.

My girlfriend always thought it was kinda mean to use lab rats, but after seeing these "heroes"... she's changed her mind slightly to "these little guys are saving lives"

As a side, this lab had some cool stuff going on. Glow in the dark mice, rats injected with cancer. I love the sentry rats that have nothing done to them... with a sign on the cage that says "If these rats are dead. Get out of the room"

Re:Little guys are saving lives/livelihoods

[fractoid]

My girlfriend always thought it was kinda mean to use lab rats, but after seeing these "heroes"... she's changed her mind slightly to "these little guys are saving lives" They're 'heroes' only in the same sense that Jewish experimental subjects in Nazi Germany* were 'heroes'. You think the poor little buggers are volunteers? Even if they make a full recovery after their ordeal they'll still be killed and dissected to confirm results. There's no escape and no hope for them.

There's arguments on both sides of the animal testing fence, but whichever side you end up on, you can never claim that there's no cost in terms of pain and suffering. Many human lives may be saved, but they're saved by a group of people being evil bastards to another group (human or otherwise) who can't defend themselves. Don't try to romanticize it or gloss over it.

* yes, you heard me, I went there. Damn you, Godwin!

Re:Little guys are saving lives/livelihoods

[Anonymous Coward]

You know what other creatures needlessly suffers a painful death... almost every single one of them. The primary exception being the fly that I just smacked against my monitor, I don't think it had enough time to feel much. What a trooper he was though, sacrificing himself so I wouldn't be annoyed. That's a real hero folks.

Anyways, if anybody wishes to find out more about how life works, take a trip to your local video store and rent The Lion King.

* It was either reply to you for the Hitler reference, or the grandparent post for mentioning glow-in-the-dark mice as heroes.

The Strogg had it right

[Anonymous Coward]

Play some Quake 4! Man, those guys were geniuses. I can refill my life using an engineered human torso! w00t

Oh joy!

[Anonymous Coward]

A cure for Dick Cheney!

In other news

[Joebert]

In other news, a connection has been found between the health of lab rat spinal cords, & the jailing of scientists who break them.

Rats in labs where scientists had been jailed were shown to have 100% healthier spines than in labs where scientists hadn't been jailed.

... and break your spine...

[EmbeddedJanitor]

with a rat trap!

Breaking rats backs?

[Safiire Arrowny]

Where exactly do researchers get rats with broken backs?

Re:Breaking rats backs?

[justinlee37]

I hate to break it to you, but they don't. They get rats that are perfectly capable of walking, and then sever their spinal cords surgically.

No

[furbearntrout]

In this porno, YOU are the schoolgirl.

Re:No

[Carbon016]

Great! I always wanted to be the schoolgirl, and now I get federal funding for it!

I know they're not mice, but.....

[robp1969]

Tonight Pinky, we're going to take over the World!

The moral of this story is

[Anonymous Coward]

Do not piss off your girlfriend.

In Soviet Russia, . . .

[Anonymous Coward]

. . . stem cells create you!!