Saturday, February 20, 2010

Stem Cell Research

Stem cell research is in our news all the time, both from a scientific point of view and a political point of view. Today we’re on the threshold of stealing a power from the gods, the power to regenerate human organs and make life much longer. There are some people who fear retribution from the gods, but I know we’re going to do this anyway. Our scientists, no matter what the political climate is, are going to learn how to use stem cells to regenerate organs.


What are Stem Cells?


Stem cells are unspecialized cells in the body that constantly divide to form a pool of cells that can then specialize when they are needed. The ultimate stem cells are embryonic stem cells. They are totipotent. They can become any cell in the organism. In laboratory experiments on animals, these embryonic stem cells can be induced to form many different cell types. In animals, these cell types coming from embryonic stem cells have cured brain damage, heart damage, muscle damage, etc. This has generated great excitement for stem cell research.

The proposal is to use laboratory grown stem cells as a supply. You don’t need a lot of embryos to do this. The problem is that if I get some stem cells from someone else, they’re not mine. Those cells going into my heart would do the work, but then my immune system would ultimately reject them.


What is the advantage of stem cell research?


There is a need for new cells in medicine to replace cells that are damaged. For example, in a heart attack, the heart muscle is damaged, and it is usually permanent damage. How are you going to replace that tissue? In the brain, Parkinson’s disease and others result from a lack of functional cells. Diabetes, specially type 1, the pancreas is damaged. Let’s get new cells to replace these!

Stem cell transplants are already performed every day. Bone marrow gets damaged when cancer is treated with radiation therapy and chemotherapy. All the cells, including the stem cells inside the bone marrow, are damaged. A person who is treated with radiation and chemotherapy for cancer is going to be severely anemic and immune-compromised; because their immune system would not be working (white blood cells would not be produced in sufficient numbers).

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