Scientists overcome hurdles to stem cell alternatives
By Rob SteinWashington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, September 30, 2010; 10:51 PM
Scientists have invented an efficient way to produce apparently safe alternatives to human embryonic stem cells without destroying embryos, a long-sought step toward bypassing the moral morass surrounding one of the most promising fields in medicine.
A team of researchers at the Harvard Stem Cell Institute in Boston published a series of experiments Thursday showing that synthetic biological signals can quickly reprogram ordinary skin cells into entities that appear virtually identical to embryonic stem cells. Moreover, the same strategy can then turn those cells into ones that could be used for transplants.
"This is going to be very exciting to the research community," said Derrick J. Rossi of the Children's Hospital Boston, who led the research published in the journal Cell Stem Cell. "We now have an experimental paradigm for generating patient-specific cells highly efficiently and safely and also taking those cells to clinically useful cell types."
Scientists hope stem cells will lead to cures for diabetes, Alzheimer's disease, spinal cord injuries, heart attacks and many other ailments because they can turn into almost any tissue in the body, potentially providing an invaluable source of cells to replace those damaged by disease or injury. But the cells can be obtained only by destroying days-old embryos.
The cells produced by the Harvard team, known as induced pluripotent stem cells, or iPS cells, would avoid that ethical objection and could in some ways be superior to embryonic stem cells. For example, iPS cells could enable scientists to take an easily obtainable skin cell from any patient and use it to create perfectly matched cells, tissue and potentially even entire organs for transplants that would be immune to rejection.
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Read more/Leia mais aqui: The Washington Post
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Highly Efficient Reprogramming to Pluripotency and Directed Differentiation of Human Cells with Synthetic Modified mRNA
Luigi Warren, Philip D. Manos, Tim Ahfeldt, Yuin-Han Loh, Hu Li, Frank Lau, Wataru Ebina, Pankaj K. Mandal, Zachary D. Smith, Alexander Meissner, George Q. Daley, Andrew S. Brack, James J. Collins, Chad Cowan, Thorsten M. Schlaeger, and Derrick J. Rossi
10.1016/j.stem.2010.08.012
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Watch video here/Assista ao vídeo aqui
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NOTA CAUSTICANTE DESTE BLOGGER:
Eu queria ver a cara de alguns bloggers tupiniquins que são anti-Bush raivosos desde nenezinhos, e que estão chorando as pitangas porque devido à sua política que considera a vida humana 'sagrada', muitas vidas humanas deixaram de ser ceifadas por esses neo-Mengeles pós-modernos nos Estados Unidos, e deixou Obama de mãos atadas após decisão judicial que impede o uso de dinheiro público neste holocausto silencioso.
Neo-Mengeles pós-modernos!!! Mayana Zats, USP, eis aqui uma saída científica que não precisa sacrificar seres humanos!!!
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Watch video here/Assista ao vídeo aqui
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NOTA CAUSTICANTE DESTE BLOGGER:
Eu queria ver a cara de alguns bloggers tupiniquins que são anti-Bush raivosos desde nenezinhos, e que estão chorando as pitangas porque devido à sua política que considera a vida humana 'sagrada', muitas vidas humanas deixaram de ser ceifadas por esses neo-Mengeles pós-modernos nos Estados Unidos, e deixou Obama de mãos atadas após decisão judicial que impede o uso de dinheiro público neste holocausto silencioso.
Neo-Mengeles pós-modernos!!! Mayana Zats, USP, eis aqui uma saída científica que não precisa sacrificar seres humanos!!!
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