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Safe Stem Cells Produced From Adult Cells
hackingbear writes "Wired, citing a paper published in Science magazine, reports that Harvard scientists may have found a safer way of giving a flake of skin the biologically alchemical powers of embryonic stem cells by turning adult cells into versatile, embryonic-like cells without causing permanent damage. The technique involves 'adding cell-reprogramming genes to adenoviruses, a type of virus that infects cells without affecting their DNA.' Four-month trials on mice demonstrated that the resulting stem cells are free from unpredictable cancer-inducing mutations. This is definitely a breakthrough in stem cell research."
Additional coverage is available at Yahoo, and Science hosts the research paper, although you'll need a subscription to see more than the abstract.
We need to find a short blond kid missing an arm and leg.
It's the only way we'll ever get any farther.
Disregard the above.
involves 'adding cell-reprogramming genes to adenoviruses
This is obviously a variation of the word 'safe' that I wasn't previously aware of.
TFA states that this new technique has only been tested on mice so far, although I truly hope that they can get this working for humans. Here's hoping that we can do effective stem cell research without the controversy.
This will end the debate on stem cells.
Embryonic stem cells were first isolated in humans by Dr. James Thomson of the University of Wisconsin in 1997. Last year, he also published a paper on getting adult stem cells to act like embryonic stem cells: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/11/071120092709.htm
Wisconsin has and licenses most of the original embryonic stem cell lines that are approved for federal funding. Of course the popular press will cling to anything done by "Harvard".
The timers on cells cannot be reset. These are older cells. You can attempt to use them for repairs, what-not. But they will never be the same as actual stem cells.
Also not sure how good a thing it is for researchers to be making viruses with gene-altering payloads that target humans. Things could go spectacularly wrong.
The whole you-cannot-use-stem-cells malarkey is just like PETA saying Ben & Jerrys should use human breast milk instead of cows milk. You know, you use the right tool for the job. Not something else because a book of fairy tales says so. (And it doesn't.)
I can't wait to see how the radical pro-lifers (and their opponents, the pro-embryo-vivisectioners) are gonna react to this. Is a virus-generated synthetic stem cell equivalent to a human being, with rights and dignity ? Why or why not ? I'll take the extra large popcorn.
People who stand against stem cell research are more likely to develop neurodegenerative diseases. Nature is the most ironic thing out there.
What I'd love to know is if these anti-stem cell nuts would decline treatment for a lethal condition that could be cured with stem cells.
"Similarly, the embryos are already being created and destroyed en masse by fertility clinics. (And yet, for some reason, pro-lifers never complain about that.) "
You're kidding, right? You're seriously trying to claim the anti-abortion crowd doesn't complain about... abortion! Wow....
The point you so studiously ignored is that many people find it sickening to create a life for the purpose of destroying it.
As far as the orgran transplants in China goes, maybe you're unaware of the moral hazard of having a system where some powerless peasant with healthy organs can be jailed and subsequently executed by an oppressive state to harvest their body for some politician or powerful business figure.
I had the same thought. I've always been taught that adult stem cells can me manipulated to behave like embryonic, but with certain limitations that embryonic cells don't have. What is the major difference here and do they mean by safer?
just as sleeping in an asbestos bed wont give you cancer. (the first 4 months..)
since sliced bread, if I'm not mistaken.
just got a root canal last week.. and started reading up on teeth.. did you know that the pulp inside of teeth is filled with stem cells... what a waste of just disposing it while getting a root canal...and why wont the teeth fix itself considering it's filled with stem cells?
Sounds like an intro to a new shooter game or another post apocalyptic action B-movie: it all started harlmessly enough with "adding cell-reprogramming genes to adenoviruses"... THEN CAME THE ZOMBIES!!!!!!! SHOOT THEM IN THE HEAD!!!! SHOOT THEM IN THE HEAD!!!!
You are mistaken. Conversion of adult stem cells into pluripotent (able to become ANY type of human cell) has been going on for more than a year.
There is no advantage whatsoever to using embryonic stem cells over adult. One significant advantage to adult stem cells is that they do not require the creation of an embryo. Say all you want about fetuses that "would have been discarded anyway" - that's only relevant during the research phase. Any therapies derived from that research would require the creation of a clone embryo from the patient, otherwise you still have to content with rejection issues. Stem cells derived from adult cells are already compatible.
Your title is wrong. This was NOT already done by the UW.
Also, your content is wrong. Thomson did NOT use adult stem cells -- his lab reprogrammed adult *skin* cells.
(That fact is even in the title of your linked story!)
Thomson used retroviral infection, as did the Yamanaka lab in Japan that did similar experiments around the same time. The Harvard lab used adenoviruses, a different vector with different outcomes.
The a major difference between retrovirus and adenovirus? Retroviruses can get the target genes inserted into eukaryotic chromosomes, making the changes more stable. But adenoviruses can be less harmful to the cells they infect, and can successfully infect more cells per treatment.
e.g. http://www.nature.com/nbt/journal/v18/n2/full/nbt0200_150.html
Of course, the right wing retort to this strawman assault would be to say
"Your body, you pay."
If you want to have the right to choose, then you ought to pay for your own medical care.
If it is your body, then you are reasonably responsible for your own sexual education and you don't need our tax money to pay for you to learn how to screw.
If you want the public to pay for your well being, then you are by definition a pet of the people at large, and conservatives have as much a right to your body at that point as you do.
Do remember that George Bush has done what he did by essentially using powers the left wing granted to itself in government for right wing ends. If you put the government in charge of health care, just imagine a future Bush deciding what the government should in fact pay for.
This is my sig.
The person being killed probably doesn't care much whether he's injected with a lethal poison or shot in the head
It's not like we could ask Jack Kennedy what he thought in the moments where his heart was still beating as they hauled him off to Parkland.
This is my sig.
Your title is wrong. This was NOT already done by the UW. Also, your content is wrong. Thomson did NOT use adult stem cells -- his lab reprogrammed adult *skin* cells. (That fact is even in the title of your linked story!) Thomson used retroviral infection, as did the Yamanaka lab in Japan that did similar experiments around the same time. The Harvard lab used adenoviruses, a different vector with different outcomes. The major difference between retrovirus and adenovirus? Retroviruses can get the target genes inserted into eukaryotic chromosomes, making the changes more stable. But adenoviruses can be less harmful to the cells they infect, and can successfully infect more cells per treatment. e.g. http://www.nature.com/nbt/journal/v18/n2/full/nbt0200_150.html [nature.com]
People don't do research on embryos because they are evil sick fucks who eat dead babies (or at least most of them I presume). They do it to advance biochemistry. Once knowledge of subject advances enough, embryos will become unnecessary. Creation of adult stem cells can be seen as at least part of the solution. I don't think we are anywhere near the territory of implanting sea slugs into the brains of little girls. Instead of pulling on a bad tooth why not just yank it out? It has to come out one way or another.
Wait a sec. The abstract for the paper says they're pleuripotent. I would think that would mean any kind of cell regardless of the fact of being adult or fetal. (Well except support tissues.) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pluripotent
These 'breakthroughs' are interesting to read about. The predictable ethical debate is a bore.
My main question is when the hell is this actually going to help someone? I've heard of a lot of studies 'planning to go to human trial' but never any results, good or bad. Did it ever make it to human trial? We've made rats, mice, chickens and pigs regenerate nerves, walk again etc. Where are human trials? North American doctors and scientists are too coward to step up to the plate. Instead we argue that the idea is somehow invalid because it didn't get published in a medical journal. If it works, I don't give a shit if Dr. so-and-so doesn't think it will.
Here's my ethical debate: if a human (with cognitive function) knows the possible risk of experimental treatments and is willing to take that risk, who do these people think they are by disallowing it?
This is exactly like laws requiring seatbelts, prohibiting drug use, and limiting pornography. The idea is, as far as I can tell, that Big Brother is watching out for you, because your cognitive function may be clouded by irrationality. Wouldn't want to let people harm themselves willingly, no sirree.
Politically correct overbearing government-hugging socialists with an obsession with saving people from themselves. That's who they think they are.
We need to be making more noise about the fact that these advances only came about via embryonic stem cell research. The genes they expressed weren't random, they started from genes they knew were expressed in embryonic stem cells.
If there is a cure for any condition that comes out of IPS cell treatment, that's benefiting from embryonic stem cell research. If you believe stem cell research is evil, you have to at the very least turn down any treatment from multi-purpose cells like this, say you were wrong, or admit you are a hypocrite.
I say that when we see treatments coming out of this, and we will, that you have to admit you're a hypocrite if you are opposed to stem cell research but get this treatment. Or better yet, pledge that in the future, you will listen to scientists and doctors on matters of science and medicine, not your local pastor.
There's also another, broader question, which last I heard nobody quite agrees on, namely "Is an undifferentiated ball of cells a human being?".
This is the big question. At what point between conception and the age of legal majority are we discussing a human being that should be under the protection of the law?
For example, if you were on a jury trying immigrants from Fiji for killing their 2 week old daughter ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infanticide#Oceania ), would you convict them for murder?
-- Support a free market in the field of government
Those mice must be tired of walking those long trails...
It's "safer" because they use an adenovirus instead of a retrovirus, so the viral DNA doesn't mingle with the cell's DNA and any trace that it was there vanishes after a few cell divisions.
I actually did a bit of research and explained all of this in my submission (which gave credit to Konrad Hochedlinger and his team, too), but I guess the other guy got there first or something. Why do they only publish the submissions where I screw something up? *sigh* :)
- I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property
Hang on a few more years, the immortality pill is coming!
There's plenty of material and interpretations for anyone who wants to find controversy.
Only if you're being a sophist. The people who are upset at fetal stem cell research aren't just making up clever arguments to dump all over people's hard work and potential medical salvation -- they genuinely believe in the whole "life starts at conception" argument.
You may not agree with pro-lifers, but you're not going to convince them to change their minds or find middle ground with the ones that are on the fence about fetal stem cells with ridiculous straw man arguments. And you're never going to make a difference if you have nothing but contempt for the other side's beliefs and the honesty with which they hold them.
Really, that applies to all of politics, faith, taste, and any other subject with an emotional element that can't be reduced to a simple proof of facts.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
This may be how it begins. We could all de-evolve starting tonight!
Mainly, because there are too many want-a-be-stupid's out there who constantly decry the ban on stem cell research that doesn't exist.
The only ban is on Federal funding for fetal stem cell research. Which has mainly only succeeded in growing tumors.
Meanwhile, many in the field have said that they do not believe they need fetal tissue. Most successful stem cell treatments have all been derived from the more stable adult stem cells.
But hey, keep on being stupid, it let's you further your hate of Bush and keep chanting and ranting. Makes you feel better. Just know you're being stupid and mis-informed.
As the adult stem cells are more stable and less prone to grow tumors. It's like putting a 16 yr old first time driver (the researchers) in a Chevy or a NASCAR. And seeing which one they have more success driving around town.
"You same types were the ones saying there was no way the earth is round or revolved around the sun."
They weren't telling Columbus the world was round. But that it was 2x-3x bigger than he thought and that he'd never make it.
Oh...guess what...they were right. And if there hadn't happened to be another continent smack in the middle of the ocean. Columbus would have died and not even been remembered.
The "fruit of the poison tree" approach only goes so far. Should we discard research done on injured or killed soldiers because that would be benefiting from the evil of war?