>Viral gene therapy (similar to techniques used in the stem cell breakthrough last week) has been used by University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center researchers in animal models and reported in the September 19, 2007 issue of the Journal of the National Cancer Institute. From MD Anderson: Since 2004 scientists have found that brain … Continue reading
>I don’t think that the Scientific Activist (“Reporting from the Crossroads of Science and Politics”) is at all happy with the “framing” of the reports on the reprogrammed adult stem cells. (beware the language) However, I did learn where some of the speculation about iPS cells being “like an embryo.” may have come from. “Activist” … Continue reading
>Well, they did it! From Reuter’s, UK: WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Two separate teams of researchers announced on Tuesday they had transformed ordinary skin cells into batches of cells that look and act like embryonic stem cells — but without using cloning technology and without making embryos. Their breakthroughs could make possible the long-sought goal of … Continue reading
>While we’re all waiting for the announcement that Shinya Yamanaka’s lab has or has not published on human embryonic-like stem cells dedifferentiated from adult stem cells . . . (The press releases hit while I was writing this post.) Wesley Smith’s blog, Secondhand Smoke has a good discussion titled, ” Just Because Someone Wants Something, … Continue reading
>Here’s a link to a post from last January on HB 14, and House Joint Resolution 90, the Bills which became Proposition 15, the Legislation for $3 billion in cancer research bonds and the Texas Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas. The original article is no longer available on the Austin American Statesman site, … Continue reading
>Texas approved Billions in bond debt, some $3 Billion of which will fund the new Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas. There is already private funding of embryonic and fetal tissue research in Texas already.(See this report on the Brown Institute in Houston.) While Texas is a leader in ethical stem cell research and … Continue reading
>Well, the news out of Great Britain that apparently healthy twins were born from a new technique involving maturation of human oocytes – “eggs” – outside of the body will probably be hailed as the solution to the problem of where to get the eggs for embryonic stem cell and cloning research. It won’t solve … Continue reading
Rather than science news, Nature Reports focuses on the political (I believe this is available without subscription, but let me know if you need a copy and can’t access it): News Feature Nature Reports Stem Cells Published online: 17 October 2007 Scientific definition by political request (by) Monya Baker The NIH must set criteria for … Continue reading
I was able to attend the “Understanding Stem Cells: Science and Policy” lecture at the Koshland Science Museum, the museum of the National Academies of Sciences, in Washington, DC last week where I heard Jonathan Moreno, PhD, – the ethicist who works for and advances the American Center for Progress and Dr. John Gearhart, Director … Continue reading
There have never been any controlled randomized trials on “Parachute use to prevent death and major trauma related to gravitational challenge,” according to this review published in the British Medical Journal in December 2003. And yet, in the nearly 3 years since it was documented in a prestigious peer-reviewed journal that the evidence supporting the … Continue reading