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Stem Cell
Research - Comprehensive Report
(Top Posts - Science - 073101)
Stem
Cells: Scientific Progress and Future Research Directions
From the National Institutes of Health [link no longer available]
-http://www.nih.gov/news/stemcell/scireport.htm-
Excerpt:
"The makings of future news headlines about tomorrow's
life saving therapies starts in the biomedical research labor-
atory.
Ideas abound; early successes and later failures and know-
ledge gained from both; the rare lightning bolt of an unex-
pected breakthrough discovery - this is a glimpse of the
behind the scenes action of some of the world's most
acclaimed stem cell scientists' quest to solve some of the
human body's most challenging mysteries.
Stem cells - what lies ahead?
The following chapters explore some of the cutting edge
research featuring stem cells.
Disease and disorders with no therapies or at best, partially
effective ones, are the lure of the pursuit of stem cell research.
Described here are examples of significant progress that is
a prologue to an era of medical discovery of cell-based
therapies that will one day restore function to those whose
lives are now challenged every day — but perhaps in the
future, no longer."
- - -
Stem Cell Debate - Can Information Change Opinions?
Logic alone is seldom enough to cause a dramatic change
to a previously strongly held opinion (not a quick dramatic
change, anyway), but nevertheless, logic/information along
with emotions (pertaining to the human lives impacted by
our success or failure in progressing to cures/improved
treatments of chronic diseases) offers the potential to be
of consequence to some (many), and ...
... of note, as with abortion/contraception and other issues
of importance whereby logical and reasonable approaches
often differ from conservative church doctrines or resistance
to progress, perhaps well-reasoned presentments will be of
value for someone either
o on the borderline,
o partly supportive of stem cell research under restricted
conditions,
o supportive but unaware of the vast potential,
o supportive and in need of further information to back up
their position,
o leaning against but interested in what might be lost if restric-
tions are too tight,
o emotionally opposed due to being unaware of the manner in
which life develops and/or unaware of the immorality entailed
in restricting research which may cure/treat millions of sentient
beings who currently are at risk of death/serious complications
from chronic diseases,
o not yet informed or concerned, ambivalent, or simply lacking
adequate information from which an intelligent decision may be
reached.
----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- -----
Type 1 Diabetes - The Risks
Having been a type 1 diabetic for 40+ years, since the age
of 5, I have a keen interest in the possibility that embry-
ological stem cell research may lead to "The Cure" for dia-
betes.
Apart from the risks from the long-term consequences of
diabetes, including kidney failure, glaucoma, blindness,
heart disease, stroke, neuropathy, amputations, and death
(diabetes kills more people each year than breast cancer +
AIDS combined), there is an extreme risk to type 1 (insulin
dependent, also known as juvenile-onset) diabetics due to
the nature of treating the disease with insulin ...
It is a 24x7x365 task, and due to the multiple levels of im-
pacts on blood glucose levels, low blood glucose events
are a constant ominous threat, placing type 1 diabetics
at extreme risk of injury or death from becoming uncon-
scious during a hypoglycemic (low blood glucose level)
episode.
The following conveys, in a vivid example, what can hap-
pen due to a low blood glucose level, an event which I and
my daughter (and a large number of medical personnel who
treated us) experienced 3 days ago ...
A Daydream?
http://prohuman.net/social_legal/daydream.htm
"So, I'm dreaming and I'm seeing people outside
standing around and I'm near this car and I'm
looking at it, it has been wrecked, and the front
is down and on the side is a tire which looks a
little like my car and ..."
----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- -----
NIH Report - Chapter 7 (Stem Cells and Diabetes)
Some parts from Chapter 7 (Stem Cells and Diabetes) that
I found to be of interest (towards the end and, by the way,
there is a significant section of this chapter which explains
the nature of type 1 and type 2 diabetes and details the state
of a lot of the research 'til now, in both stem cells and other
areas) ...
Chapter 7 - Stem Cells and Diabetes
[link no longer available]
-http://www.nih.gov/news/stemcell/chapter7.pdf-
From page 72: "... Embryonic Stem Cells - The dis-
covery of methods to isolate and grow human embry-
onic stem cells in 1998 renewed the hopes of doctors,
researchers, and diabetes patients and their families
that a cure for type 1 diabetes, and perhaps type 2
diabetes as well, may be within striking distance. ...
Since their discovery three years ago, several teams
of researchers have been investigating the possibility
that human embryonic stem cells could be developed
as a therapy for treating diabetes.
Recent studies in mice show that embryonic stem cells
can be coaxed into differentiating into insulin-producing
beta cells, and new reports indicate that this strategy
may be possible using human embryonic cells as well. ..."
- - -
From page 74: "... Recent research has also provided
more evidence that human embryonic cells can develop
into cells that can and do produce insulin. ...
Taken together, these results indicate that the develop-
ment of a human embryonic stem cell system that can
be coaxed into differentiating into functioning insulin-
producing islets may soon be possible.
Future Directions
Ultimately, type 1 diabetes may prove to be especially
difficult to cure, because the cells are destroyed when
the body's own immune system attacks and destroys
them. This autoimmunity must be overcome if
researchers hope to use transplanted cells to replace
the damaged ones. ...
A potential advantage of embryonic cells is that, in
theory, they could be engineered to express the appro-
priate genes that would allow them to escape or reduce
detection by the immune system.
Others have suggested that a technology should be
developed to encapsulate or embed islet cells de-
rived from islet stem or progenitor cells in a mater-
ial that would allow small molecules such as insulin
to pass through freely, but would not allow inter-
actions between the islet cells and cells of the im-
mune system. ..."
- - -
From page 75: "...Embryonic stem cells show the
greatest promise for generating cell lines that will be
free of contaminants and that can self renew.
However, most researchers agree that until a thera-
peutically useful source of human islet cells is devel-
oped, all avenues of research should be exhaustively
investigated, including both adult and embryonic
sources of tissue."
----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- -----
Stem Cells - Basic Information (NIH Report - Executive Summary)
Early (4 to 5 day) embryonic stem cells (called the blastocyst)
and fetal tissue that was destined to become part of the gonads
are pluripotent (capable of developing into almost all of the cells
of the human body). They can proliferate indefinitely, although
there are important differences between embryonic stem cells
and stem cells from fetal tissue.
Adult stem cells, per the report, are typically derived from bone
marrow, blood, the cornea and the retina of the eye, brain, skeletal
muscle, dental pulp, liver, skin, the lining of the gastrointestinal
tract, and pancreas. Adult stem cells are rare. Often, they are
difficult to identify, isolate, and purify.
Adult stem cells cannot proliferate indefinitely. There are adult
stem cells (such as from the brain and bone marrow) that have
stem cell plasticity (ability to develop into cells of various types).
However, adult stem cells and pluripotent stem cells differ in
important ways and it is not known as to the extent that adult
stem cells can be used in cell-based therapies.
~~~
The above was extrapolated from the Executive Summary:
[link no longer available]
-http://www.nih.gov/news/stemcell/execsummary.pdf-
Excerpt from pages ES-4 & ES-5 of the Executive Summary:
"...
Transplantation Research - Restoring Vital Body Functions
Stem cells may hold the key to replacing cells lost in many
devastating diseases. There is little doubt that this potential
benefit underpins the vast interest in stem cell research.
What are some of these diseases? Parkinson's disease,
diabetes, chronic heart disease, end-stage kidney disease,
liver failure, and cancer are just a few for which stem
cells have therapeutic potential.
For many diseases that shorten lives, there are no effective
treatments but the goal is to find a way to replace what
natural processes have taken away. ...
The use of stem cells to generate replacement tissues for
treating neurological diseases is a major focus of research.
Spinal cord injury, multiple sclerosis, Parkinson's disease,
and Alzheimer's disease are among those diseases for
which the concept of replacing destroyed or dysfunctional
cells in the brain or spinal cord is a practical goal.
This report features several recent advances that demon-
strate the regenerative properties of adult and embryonic
stem cells.
Another major discovery frontier for research on adult
and embryonic stem cells is the development of trans-
plantable pancreatic tissues that can be used to treat
diabetes.
Scientists in academic and industrial research are vig-
orously pursuing all possible avenues of research, in-
cluding ways to direct the specialization of adult and
embryonic stem cells to become pancreatic islet-like
cells that produce insulin and can be used to control
blood glucose levels.
Researchers have recently shown that human embryonic
stem cells to be directly differentiated into cells that pro-
duce insulin. ...
Therapeutic Delivery Systems
Stem cells are already being explored as a vehicle for
delivering genes to specific tissues in the body. Stem
cell-based therapies are a major area of investigation
in cancer research. ...
Other Applications of Stem Cells
Future uses of human pluripotent cell lines might include
the exploration of the effects of chromosomal abnormal-
ities in early development. This might include the ability
to monitor the development of early childhood tumors,
many of which are embryonic in origin. ..."
----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- -----
Christopher Reeve on politics and stem cell research
July 29, 2001 Posted: 5:15 PM EDT (2115 GMT)
http://www.cnn.com/2001/ALLPOLITICS/07/29/reeve.cnna/index.html
Excerpt: Actor and activist Christopher Reeve has a
personal interest in the federal funding of embryonic stem
cell research. He was paralyzed from the neck down when
he was thrown from a horse back in 1995. ...
Christopher Reeve: "Well, in my case, I suffer from something
called demyelination. And that means that, in one very small
segment of my spinal cord, about the width of your pinky, the
coating, myelin, which is like the rubber coating around a wire,
has come off. And that keeps signals from the brain from get-
ting down into the body.
So the human embryonic stem cells could be cultured and
then sent right to the site, and they would know that their
job is to remyelinate. And then the signals from the brain
would go down properly, and I would get recovery of func-
tion.
But let me say that I think this research is important not just
for people with spinal-cord injuries, but let's just take the
case of people that have ALS, Lou Gehrig's disease. There's
no cure for it whatsoever. And it is always fatal within two
to six years. The body just degeneratively falls apart.
Now, what a couple of researchers did recently is proof of
principle, which is very, very important. It was Dr. Gerhard
and Dr. Kerr at Johns Hopkins, and they were able to inject
mice or rats with a virus which simulates ALS. They then
injected human embryonic stem-cells. Then, over a period
of time, the progression of deterioration was stopped, and
all the rats showed recovery of function.
Now, that is proof, because some people say, well, we
don't know what embryonic stem cells can do; it's never
been proven. Well, that's a huge first step. And of course
we won't know what they can do until we go and do the
work. But the work must not be stopped, absolutely."
----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- -----
Human Choices Regarding Conception Compared to
Acts of Nature (or god, if one prefers)
Statistics of interest ...
In 1997, the abortion ratio was 306 legal induced abortions
per 1,000 live births (in the U.S.). [link no longer available]
-http://prochoice.about.com/library/blcdcabsurv1997.htm-
Per the following web site, by 12 weeks, about half of the
embryos that implanted may have spontaneously aborted
(about 80% since conception), due to nature (or if one
prefers, due to god).
So, if all of the 20% survivors made up the totality of
the 1,306 potentially live births (detailed above), the
number of conceptions that would have failed solely
due to nature (or god, if one prefers) would be 5 times
that number, a total of 6,530 failed conceptions by
nature (or god, if one prefers) per 1,306 potential live
births.
306 abortions by human decision. 6,530 abortions by
god (or nature, if one is a realist), per 1,306 potential
live births.
- - -
SHAPING GENES: Ethics, Law and Science of Using
New Genetic Technology in Medicine and Agriculture
http://www.biol.tsukuba.ac.jp/~macer/SG5.html
- - -
Per those opposed to embryological stem cell research,
ALL embryos, no matter what, not used to save lives
and cure diseases. Per those opposed to embryological
stem cell research, all of the live births, the sentient and
feeling beings that grow to have meaningful and purpose-
ful existences despite being attacked by cancer, diabetes,
Parkinson's disease, Alzheimer's, multiple sclerosis, spinal
injury, chronic heart disease, end-stage kidney disease,
liver failure, and a host of other maladies that might be
ameliorated/cured by embryological stem cell research,
all must suffer and many must die in an effort to sanctify
opposition to the less than 5 percent of conceptions in
which humans have chosen to discontinue a pregnancy.
- - -
Additional information for perspectives on the nature of
the origin of life ...
Beginning of Human Life (040501)
http://prohuman.net/social_legal/beginning_of_human_life.htm
"Complex, emotional, and controversial
issues to deal with here. Human embryos
and fetuses are totally dependent on another
human being, the mother, for their welfare ..."
- - -
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