Nobel-winning stem cell work helps curtail embryonic research

Stockholm, Sweden, Oct 8, 2012.

Moral theologian Father Thomas Berg is praising the work of Shinya Yamanaka, the winner of this year's Nobel Prize in medicine, for helping to “put human embryonic stem cell research largely out of business.”

Yamanaka and John B. Gurdon, researchers in cell biology, were awarded the 2012 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for their discoveries about the generation of stem cells.

“Yamanaka will be remembered in history as the man who put human embryonic stem cell research largely out of business, motivated by reflection on the fact that his own daughters were once human embryos,” Fr. Berg, professor of moral theology at St. Joseph's Seminary in Yonkers, N.Y. told CNA Oct. 8.

Gurdon's research was conducted in 1962 and showed that it is possible to reverse the specialization of cells. He removed a nucleus from a frog’s intestinal cell and placed it into a frog's egg cell that had its nucleus taken out.

That egg cell was then able to develop into a typical tadpole, and his work was the basis for later research into cloning.

Until Gurdon's findings, it was believed that cell development could only happen in one direction, and that a mature cell nucleus could never become immature and pluripotent. A cell is called pluripotent if it can develop into any type of cell in the body.

Building on Gordon's work, Yamanaka published a paper in 2006 demonstrating that intact, mature cells can become immature stem cells. He inserted genes into mouse cells which reprogrammed those cells so that they became stem cells.

These reprogrammed cells are pluripotent. Yamanaka's breakthrough opened the door to studying disease and developing diagnosis and treatments.

Since this technique can produce a stem cell from any cell, it provides an alternative to embryonic stem cells, which are derived from destroyed human embryos.

Continue reading at Catholic News Agency (CNA).

Embryonic Stem Cell Researchers lack good taste as well as good ethics

Embryonic Stem Cell Researchers combine poetry, scripture, and stupidity so as to make themselves feel good about themselves. Somebody should tell them that whilst Jesus willingly gave up his life for the benefit of others, the human embryos killed for their stem cells don't... their life is extinguished by researchers.

Stem C.


By Tyson Anderson

This is my body

which is given for you.
But I am not great.

I have neither wealth,

nor fame, nor grace.

I cannot comfort with words,

nor inspire to march.

I am small and simple,
so leave me this.
Let me heal you.
This is my body
which is given for you.

Take this

in remembrance of me.

Read more at Mary Meets Dolly.

Good news for Catholic Bioethics:

Researchers pioneer new method to generate non-embryonic stem cells

 Boston, Mass., Oct 1, 2010 / 07:03 am (CNA).-

In what one expert calls a “major paper,” researchers have reported new advances in creating efficient and safe alternatives to human embryonic stem cells.
A team led by Derrick J. Rossi of the Children’s Hospital Boston used laboratory-made versions of natural biological signals to quickly convert ordinary skin cells into cells that appear virtually identical to embryonic stem cells. They can then coax these cells to change into specific tissues that would be a match for transplantation into patients, the Washington Post reports
Continue reading Researchers pioneer new method to generate non-embryonic stem cells :: Catholic News Agency (CNA)

Embryonic Stem Cell Researchers Promise Everything but Deliver Nothing

By Diogenes | August 24, 2010 Catholic Culture

Read all the mainstream-media coverage of Judge Royce Lamberth’s decision to stop federal funding for embryonic stem-cell research, and you may notice that two major themes emerge. Neither theme is inaccurate, yet both are misleading.

First, the conventional accounts remind readers that embryonic stem-cell research (ESCR) has great potential.

It is “promising but controversial research,” says the Wall Street Journal. It is a “promising new science,” Time magazine agrees. Scientists “hope to be able to use” ESCR to treat many diseases, Reuters reports. The Los Angeles Times cites a White House spokesman who said judge’s decision “carries the potential to block ‘critical, life-saving research.’" [My emphasis throughout]

Promise... promising… potential…hope. What you don’t see, in all those news accounts, is a report that scientists have used ESCR successfully to treat diseases, or are using ESCR in clinical settings right now. You don’t even read about successful ESCR experiments that could soon lead to medical breakthroughs.

Continue reading at Catholic Culture : Off the Record : promise them anything

Politics: A Decade Later: Time for a Dose of Reality on Stem Cells

August 2010. Catholic News Agency (CNA)

By Richard Doerflinger

In 1998, Dr. James Thomson of the University of Wisconsin first isolated human embryonic stem cells (ESCs). These early, unspecialized cells were hailed as a way to create all cell types of the human body at will, a Holy Grail for curing diseases. Moral qualms about killing embryos for the cells were swept away in this wave of enthusiasm. In a few years, it was said, life-saving medical advances would show that such objections should be ignored.

A decade later, it is time for a reality check. ESCs have been involved in some interesting experiments, but are not close to producing cures. This is not due to limited federal funding—it is equally true in countries with no such limits, and in states pouring their own public funds into the research. ESCs in fact are unpredictable, difficult to control, and prone to causing tumors in animals. Experts now admit that human treatments using them may not emerge for decades, if ever.

The bishops’ statement Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship urges Catholics to become informed on important moral issues in public life, including this issue of destroying embryos for stem cell research.

Continue reading - A Decade Later: Time for a Dose of Reality on Stem Cells :: Catholic News Agency (CNA)

Leading stem cell scientist quietly drops embryonic work

by Michael Cook | 3 Jul 2010

Amongst scientists who promoted the use of human embryonic stem cells five years ago, in the middle of passionate debates in the US, Australia and elsewhere, few were more influential in shaping the ethical debate than Harvard’s George Q. Daley. “We must support the vitally important applications of embryonic stem cells to medical research,” he testified to a Congressional committee in 2005.

He contended that work on hESCs was so important that it could not be delayed. It was needed for cures, drug development and genetic research. The fact that years had passed without results made no difference. “The field of human embryonic stem cell research is a mere 7 years old, so it is premature to expect successful cell therapies to have already been delivered to patients.”

Now, he has transferred the same sense of urgency and excitement to an ethical non-controversial alternative to hESC research which he dismissed before the committee – induced pluripotent stem cells (iPS cells). At the time, he said, “Although this strategy is worth pursuing, it is extremely high-risk, and may take years to perfect, and may never work as well as nuclear transfer, which we know we can practice today.”

However, in 2007 iPS cells were developed by Shinya Yamanaka. Professor Daley immediately stopped campaigning for hESCs. In an interview with Nature Medicine, he says, “Once Yamanaka solved the problem, I turned around virtually my entire program to take advantage of that breakthrough.”

In language remarkably similar to his 2005 testimony, he now promotes iPS cells: “There's no reason in my mind to think that we're not going to have iPS cells that function as well as embryonic stem cells.” Why haven’t there been any cures yet? “You can't hold the field to too high a standard. It's only been two years, and a lot of this stuff is in the pipeline.” ~ Nature Medicine, June

Continue reading at BioEdge: Leading stem cell scientist quietly drops embryonic work