Scientists synthesize stem cells without embryos

Discovery, if successful, could end ethical and religious debate

Derek DeGraad
Staff Writer

SOURCE: Telegraph.co.uk

On Nov. 20, two separate teams of scientists in Wisconsin and Japan reported that they had converted human skin cells into what appear to be embryonic stem cells, a breakthrough that could potentially end the ethical debate about the procedure.

The destruction of human embryos has made stem cell research one of the most divisive issues in American politics and has led to passionate controversy between those who believe that an embryo has the rights of a human being and those who favor research and believe in the potential for stem cells to one day treat or cure conditions such as Alzheimer's and paralysis.

According to a Washington Post editorial, in 2006, President Bush issued the first veto of his term, rejecting a bid by Congress to ease funding restrictions for human embryonic stem cell research, saying that the bill would "support the taking of innocent human life in the hope of finding medical benefits for others."

"Everyone was waiting for this day to come," said Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, in a Nov. 21 New York Times article. He is the director of education at the National Catholic Bioethics Center. "You should have a solution here that will address the moral objections that have been percolating for years," he said.

According to the article, the scientists were able to achieve their results by adding four genes to human skin cells that reprogrammed their chromosomes essentially making them into blank slates that could be programmed to turn into any of the 220 types of cells in the human body.

The reprogrammed stem cells may yet prove to have subtle differences from embryonic cells that are taken from human embryos. The new method also requires potentially risky steps, like introducing a cancer gene, but the scientists involved are confident that further research will perfect the method and that today's drawbacks are only temporary.

"The fact that two separate labs, one headed by Dr. Shinya Yamanaka and the other headed by Dr. James Thompson, found a way to generate embryonic stem cells from human skin cells without having to produce or use human embryos or fetal tissue in the process, has enormous implications for the field of stem cell research," said Patricia Astry, director of the medical technology department of Biology at Fredonia. "This new technique of reprogramming 'older' cells to produce stem cells does not require the use of embryos or fetal tissue, and therefore bypasses that ethical conundrum."

She is also optimistic about the progress made during the past 25 years in the field of stem cell research, which began with the isolation of embryonic stem cells in 1981 by Sir Martin Evans, who won this year's Nobel Prize for Medicine. However, she cautioned that the translation of this research into useful and safe therapies is just beginning to show promise.

"This is not unusual for research in the science discipline. In most areas of scientific research, a tremendous amount of hard work and discovery has to occur before any useful application can be safely made to address real-life problems," Astry said.

If the recipe for this stem cell-like behavior can be perfected, individual "pluripotent" cells could be created for the purpose of testing treatments for a particular disease. Pluripotent cells are cells that can be programmed to turn into other types of cells and multiply.

Say, for example, scientists developed an experimental treatment for Parkinson's disease, but they couldn't immediately test it on a human subject since there might be dangerous side effects. Many researchers now envision a future where they could use stem cells to create actual living human neurons in a Petri dish in order to test their treatments, thus speeding up medical breakthroughs and doing away with the need for human experiments.

Despite the advancement, it is not yet clear whether stem cell research on human embryos will end anytime soon.

"I don't think that embryonic stem cell research should cease given this new approach. They will certainly begin to work with the new technology, but their current research should not be disrupted," said Theodore Lee, chair of the molecular genetics program at Fredonia. "This is a big step in addressing the issues that some have with embryonic stem cells. The field of stem cell research is extremely promising but much work still needs to be done."