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Human Skin Cells Converted Directly To Neurons
Dr. Eggman writes "Stanford's School of Medicine brings us an update in the latest achievements towards in-vitro neuron generation via redifferentiation of specialized cells (skin cells in this case.) This important progress follows on last year's success in inducing this change with mice skin cells. The importance of this line of research lies in that the process does not need to first de-differentiate the skin cells into a kind of stem cells known as induced pluripotent stem cells. By skipping this phase, the process avoids potential problems in the body's rejection of the iPS cells. Amazingly, the transformation occurs with the added presence of 4 proteins (one more protein than need to induce the effect in mice) over several weeks (compared to a few days in mice.) Research continues as the study highlights the significant differences in mice and human neural cells as well as the success rate of transformation (2-4% for human cells, 20% for mice.) The resultant cells aren't yet as capable as naturally derived neurons; generating less-robust electrical signals."
In the Woody Allen movie, "The Sleeper", the "fearless leader" is recreated from cells cloned from his nose.... it's beginning to look like he was right.
Next thing we know, we'll find out that nuts are bad for us.
Admit? At best I could not deny it, lacking data. Generally my view would be that God is not required to explain the universe. Combined with Occam's Razor, the conclusion would be that from a lack of need stems a lack of existence. If he exists, a condition we cannot test as far as I know, he is superfluous concerning our existence. So worship him if you feel like it, but it's proven that it is not a requirement for existence. Huh? Yes, it's proven. A lot of people existed before the first time God was worshiped and a lot of people exist who never heard of him, so it's pretty much established that you can exist without him.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Normally the growth factors would cause a signal at the cell surface that eventually changed the amount of various neuronal genes being expressed.They skipped that step here by using viruses to insert extra copies of the neuronal genes into the skin cells. I should note that the neuronal genes are still present in the skin cells but are being suppressed. What this process does is insert extra, non-suppressed copies of those genes.