Stem Cells Change Man's DNA

An anonymous reader writes "After receiving umbilical cord stem cells to replace bone marrow as treatment for non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, Greg Graves temporarily had three different sets of DNA. Eventually, one of the two sets of cells transplanted into his bone marrow took root, leaving him different DNA in his blood from the rest of his body: 'If you were to do a DNA test of my blood and one from my skin, they'd be different,' Graves said. 'It's a pretty wild thing.'"

Comments

Re:This scares the hell out of me.

[Xonstantine]

Not to sound like a bible thumper but should we really be playing god with something we barely understand. Well, since it's pretty clear you don't understand it, it's probably a good idea that you don't go off and play around with it.

In answer to your question "While this is an amazing break-through what will happen if this guy has offspring?", the answer is nothing. At least, nothing different than if he hadn't had stem cells implanted. For there to be any difference, there would've had to have replaced the spermatogonia.

Change or add?

[pembo13]

Seems to me that the stem cells added new DNA material, it didn't mutate his existing DNA material.. so why use the word change?

Re:Beginning of the end?

[provigilman]

You're assuming that the police are aware of the multiple DNA profiles. At least in the US we have very strict privacy rules governing medical information...we can't just make someone where a bracelet saying "I have two DNA profiles!!!". Since it's in his medical records it's sealed and someone would either have to remember his name from a news story, or he would need to volunteer the info. (And yes, they can subpoena the medical records, but they would have no cause for doing so unless they already knew)

So if their DNA evidence came from skin or hair cells he could happily submit to a blood test to confirm that he's not the killer...all without their knowledge. Or vice-versa...they have blood and he says "Yeah, I'll give you a sample, but I don't like needles. Can we just do a cheek swab?"

Probably what this will lead to, if anything, is duplicate testing and/or testing of the same material as what was found. You find saliva, you test saliva. You find blood, you test blood.