Focus 580; The Proteus Effect: Stem Cells and Their Promise for Medicine

Good morning welcome to focus 580 our morning talk show My name is David inch. Glad to have you with us in the first hour today we'll be exploring the science of stem cell research with science journalist and Parson. There are many scientists who believe stem cells could be very very useful for Regenerative Medicine and could make possible cures for a wide range of diseases including also Amerson Parkinson's diabetes heart disease. Others will try on this hour of the show to review the basics talk a little bit about what stem cells are and where they come from and also consider some of the ethical issues that have arisen with the science and of course people who are listening are welcome to call in with questions and comments. Let me tell a bit more about our guest and parson has written about a number of medical topics. She's the co-author of a book decoding darkness the search for the genetic causes of all Simers disease. She also has written articles for The Boston Globe The New York Times McCall's San Diego Union-Tribune and the Harvard Health Letter from 1990 until 1998 she taught in Boston University's graduate program in science journalism and she's the author of a recently published book

that's titled The Proteus effect stem cells and their promise for medicine is published by the Joseph Henry press and is out now Philo. Look for it in the bookstore. Questions too are welcome as we talk. The number here in Champaign Urbana 3 3 3 9 4 5 5. We do also have a toll free line that means that no matter where you live if it would be a long distance call you may use the toll free line and will pay for the call that's 800 to 2 2 9 4 5 5 so in around Illinois and Indiana anywhere the signal travel or if you happen to be listening on the Internet so long here in the United States you can use the toll free. That's 800 to 2 2 9 4 5 5 again here in Champaign Urbana 3 3 3 9 4 5 5. MS A parson Hello. Hi there thanks for talking with us today. Oh nice to be on your show. We certainly appreciate it. I mean I think that even though there's been a fair amount of coverage of the subject of stem cell research and some of the issues raised I expect that probably there will be some people who still are not really sure what it is that we are talking

about. So I think it probably be a good idea to go right to the most basic questions first and talk a little bit about that and then go on from there so perhaps though the most basic question that one can ask is what is a stem cell. Well a stem cell is an immature cell that possesses the potential to become a. The Civic Type of mature self. So in other words you think of all life as having two types of self image ur self which is a stem cell or a more mature cell. And the great thing about a stem cell is that it can keep dividing. Over and over and over again where is the mature self. Kind of gets runs out of its speed so to speak and doesn't keep dividing. So the whole notion the whole idea here is to use immature stem cells to make a mature cells that can help replace the diseased cells in the body. There are different kinds of stem cells and this and maybe here it would be

useful to talk a little bit about what happens from the point where we have conception the point where you get these this berm and the egg together and then from that point as you start to get cell division and start to have greater numbers of cells right. Well at day five in the human embryo day five the embryo is a round ball has approximately just a couple hundred cells. And in the middle of that ball just about day five there's something called the inner cell mass which has a group of stem cells in it. Now those That's a very transient population of stem cells. That little embryo is actually hasn't reached the uterus it has and attached to the uterine wall and wants it on say a 7 or 8. Those stem cells start differentiating i.e. they start specializing. So in terms of different populations of stem cells the first one to think about and the one

that is so controversial because it means getting that out of the little embryo is the one in the embryo and it's specifically it's a five or six day old embryo. Then you have another version of stem cell which is actually a new in all of your organs most of your organs you have something called the adult stem cell. And that's a little bit more differentiated i.e. specialized but it still has the capacity to to multiply add in an item. Have have I lost you yet. No no no I gotcha. And I think here that what to me is an important point for people to understand because the techno terminology can be a little confusing we talk about adult stem cells right. Yes indeed and adult human beings you have adult stem cells but those actually appear long long time before even before you have. A fetus you have adult stem cells so we're talking about is is a kind of change in the potential of the cells

that occurs very early in the development. Actually yeah actually I love it I forgot who said it but somebody said there is a lot of biology between the immature cell and the mature hisself and there are many different stages as cells differentiate outward down a certain lineage but yes you have but you have this is definitely a primary stem cell in the embryo and it does start losing some of its how should I say versatility the older the embryo gets the more a stem embryonic stem cell goes in the traction of becoming an adult. Stem cell is losing some of its potential so the stem cells you have in the adult body for instance you have stem cell skin stem cells you have blood stem cells and those really are within a lineage and. And so they're more specialized.

So the difference would be is when you have when you're at the embryonic stage you could have a stem cell say that could either be that that could become anything. But once you go just a few steps down the road there then you have stem cells that take on specific kind of functionally according to the organ or system that they that they live in and for instance the you know the skin stem cell is it under under the skin and constantly regenerating the skin. Again these are adult stem cells and there's one in the gut that constantly turns up. You know our gut is turning over all the time constantly replenishing those gut cells. There are few organs they haven't found adult stem cells in yet but they think there might be one one progenitor cells now this is to throw another term in here not to confuse you but I think of those as sort of in-between them in adult cells. There are those are itself that have stamina as they put it.

And you know I probably should even bring that up. Well here and I guess then and then. Now if people have this basic idea that that we do in the course of human development there are cells that can initially if you get them early enough there are cells that could be anything and then a little bit further down the line you get cells that do still have this regenerative capability but they but there are specific things they're intended to do. The idea is that if we could harness that capability either of those initial cells to be anything or of the adult stem cells again to rebuild certain kinds of tissues then there's the therapeutic applications are at least in theory are obvious that if you have damaged or damaged organ damage tissue something that's not functioning the way that it should be. The idea is that if you could take these cells and somehow introduce them into the body that they could then rebuild or

replace that thing that's damaged. Yeah I mean it's terrific quickly. I really feel we're at a turning point with this because it's a sort of a new standard for me. Madison that would be using the cells of our body to cure or treat ourselves. And you know it's finally that the biology of the cell is being understood well enough that we can go in this direction so it's tremendously exciting and promising. It's not witchcraft it's real. We already have some stem cell treatments that are actually out there and have proven themselves. Well I guess that that we are we are we really talking about something that is still at the level of theory. That is we have an idea of what we would hope to be able to do but we're not really sure how exactly we would achieve that technique technically or we actually are actually scientists to during this research have a pretty good idea about how

exactly they would do it. Well it's just too too too early to generalize. You know all these different pursuits for different diseases that are at various stages as I say there is there is the fact that there were using stem cells in the blood for bone marrow transplant patients which have been working now for 40 years. So that is a stem cell therapy that is showing that you can use those stem cells that live in the blood in the car in the. Marrow that make the blood cells. All the cells for the blood an immune system that's you know that's the proof. What That's one proof that that treatment works. There are other novel treatments for many many different diseases which are far from completion I mean they're just really at the beginning stages.

Our guest in this hour folks 580 Ann parson She's a science journalist and has written a lot about very subject and medicine and technology and in the environment and her most recent book is titled The Proteus effect which looks at stem cells and their promise for medicine that's the subtitle Joseph Henry press as a publisher. Questions welcome 3 3 3 9 4 5 5. Toll free 800 to 2 2 9 4 5 5. I think you point out in the book that certainly scientists and naturalists had observed that within nature there are creatures that have amazing capacity to regenerate. You know you go out and get a starfish and you cut off one of the arms it'll grow back. Right. Unfortunately human beings don't work that way. But at what point did scientist really begin to understand this idea of regeneration and how it could happen and then come to this understanding that in in human beings there are cells that actually have that. The capacity to do that. Well it's been a race and just to go back to something said about the animals that

regenerates I talk in the book about this little hydra which is a little sea creature one third of an inch long. And the reason that you can cut it in many different many different times and it still grows all of that grows back is because it's really chock full of stem cells. And it's I think taken a long time right up through the 80s and 90s to realize how important the availability of stem cells in an organ is to regeneration. That's really been a recent occurrence. And and even those stem cells for instance were taken out of mice embryos back in the night early 1980s. They were really only first isolated and kept going in a dish. And that's a very important part of maintaining them keeping being able to keep them living and dividing in a dish that only happened. For the human embryo in 1988. So if it were

really really at the beginning here of understanding how to regenerate the body and and how to go in this direction which many people call regeneration medicine. We have couple callers here when we do that and we'll start with someone in our Banda one number. Right. Points questions. One is with stem cells and bone marrow. I've listed myself as a bone marrow donor a potential donor and my recollection of the information to potential donors about this is that they had to type you and then match you in a multi-step process. So isn't it the adult bone marrow stem cells. If I'm understanding this correctly are not essentially universal donors is there a difference in that between adult stem cells and embryonic stem cells. I want to say yes I kind of do and I I hope I answer this correctly for you but

my understanding is that you assume the adult song marrow stem cell. Not to confuse the issue but there are. Well the one that's used for for reconstituting the blood and. Systems it's hard it's a hard match. And I think it's something like well over the majority of people cannot find a match in their family which is usually the source of a match. It's matching tissue tissue. So that if you have sun marrow stem cells put back into you from someone else they have to match your genetic profile. Now there is the hope that a younger stem cells those from the embryo or those from cord blood umbilical cord blood which is taken from the umbilical cord of the baby those being less mature stem cells are able to make for a better

match more easily. Is that sort of answering what you're asking. Well that that was what I my sense was I hadn't really thought about it but I've been on the donor lived registry with I don't know 10 15 years now but they've never found and never matched me up with anybody. As somebody needing a donor for me. Then my second point that I'd like to make is in the something I hadn't really realized until a conversation with my daughter when she was pregnant we were talking about miscarriages and she was saying that she's learned from she learned from her view and that many more women miscarrying really early and now are realizing it and used to realize that because they were only right because we had better pregnancy tests than we are now than we did say when I was at children. And I just thought to myself well that's interesting to me to see if I can find out what the percentage was so I went to websites and I looked at it on the Internet and I'm looking I just put typed in miscarriage. And I also

looked at a couple of books in the library and the percentage of fertilized they figure that don't implant and don't or don't go on to full term birth. We're not talking about abortion here we have a natural process is 60 percent. Isn't that amazing. Oh I know. And and I mean that's one reason for using leftover in-vitro fertilization embryos. I've heard that up to 75 percent. The little embryo that's in the fallopian tube. 75 percent never get down to the uterus to attach. So all of those are lost. Well that meant to me it says that if you want to get fitter that this is a person and of equal value with somebody who's already here then why does 60 percent up not ever make it naturally to me that a fertilized egg is not. Nature doesn't. We can call it nature you can call it does not consider this to be the same as a living person and doesn't mean I think we should be careful.

But it had helped give me some perspective about the relative value that Nature puts on these. I'm so glad you mentioned that this is a key thing. I meant to also it just. I think shows you that sometimes we're maybe humans are being a little bit too moral overly moral about something that nature has no morals about. Do you understand and. You know we're trying to. We're just trying to protect that little 5 day old embryo and perhaps say we can't use it. But then nature is is getting rid of it all the time inside the woman's womb. Thanks I know. Go on to another caller here with a different one of you I'm sure Bloomington Indiana line number four. Oh I could could I ask you to clear up some of the confusion about stem cell research first. Isn't it true there is no ban on embryonic stem cell research that the federal government as a matter of fact that very little very little embryonic stem cell research is going on in the federal government

is financing that which is going on in a limited number of lines of embryonic stem cells but they have not banned a private embryo embryonic. That that's that's absolutely correct and I think Senator Kerry just finally caught on I think he was misusing he was using the word ban and many other people have. No it's not banned what's what what's happened is that there is a restriction on the number of and work human embryonic stem cell lines that can that researchers can use. There's not a restriction however on the amount of money coming from the federal government. And more and more money is being given by the government for use of only those couple of lines. Well now even though there isn't. There's private researchers are completely free to exactly onic stem cells. The the the it isn't the government's

lack of financing that keeps this embryonic stem cell from research from occurring. It is the fact that embryonic stem cells are not very promising embryonic and literally all of the medical benefits of stem cell research have been achieved by adult stem cells because adult stem cells are much more easily controlled to form the desired tissue in other words if you put in adult stem cell a nervous tissue that that adult stem cell becomes nervous tissue as you put it on bone tissue it becomes bone tissue. On the other hand if you use embryonic stem cells you don't know what they're going to become they usually go out of control. They they usually will burn. It always produces malignant tissue within a few generations. But you know it's so early as I pointed out we only got this stem cell from the embryo in 1998 and there's so much to understand and we shouldn't be in a rush we need to really investigate this. It seems

from least from all my conversations and I've had you know quite a few with sinus that it seems that they really feel it has more potential than the adult. But but they too are they just want to do their work on both versions of stem cells to find out which one will work and which is the most available surely but there isn't any venom that they get they're free to do it. And they are doing it more and more in private situations. And. But you know there are a ton of academic laboratories that are beholden to put Bush's restrictions. And as one postdoc said to me recently he said the problem is it's like being given a million dollars to build a house but only having very few. Two by fours and other words because of the restriction of numbers of cell lines the sinus just really don't have enough cells to work with embryonic stem cells. That is they have plenty of money from the government if they want to. They just don't have

fresh good stem cell lines. Well again appreciate the coming of the caller. For people who don't have a lot of background in the subject we've leapt. Right into the middle of the controversy essentially And basically the issue is is this for that for some people they they would they believe that at the moment of conception where you get the egg and sperm together you have a person. So then the embryo they considered to be a person then they don't believe that embryos should be killed in that that's what that's the word that they would use should be sacrifice should be destroyed to get the embryonic stem cells and that's what you have to do. So these people who have that have that belief certainly believe that embryos should not be produced specifically as a source of stem cells and they would go further they would say any embryos that had that or even in the world now. While that were produced for couples who were having problems conceiving to you know that to be used in in vitro fertilization they wouldn't

and are now frozen. They wouldn't even want to go as far as to say use those and to support their argument they they go further and they say well you know we do have adult stem cells and why even bother with embryonic stem cells and all of the ethical issues that attach to them if we can use the adult stem cells and you just simply don't have that problem in the press. And as as people may understand what the president did in looking at this controversy he said Well as far as federal funding goes that he would go ahead and say federal funding could still be applied to existing stem cell lines but not to creating new ones which then gets us to the point where the point that the caller rightly makes is that that there's nothing to prevent private industry or private funders from funding any kind of research that they want. They don't have to use the existing lines. They could you know that they could do any kind of research they wanted that that kind of ban only affects any researchers that are going to be using federal money right

now. I mean let me ask you one further question and I'll shut up and go for you. It's odd that the question of the adequacy of the existing lines existing stem cell lines some some people have said look we have these existing stem cell lines and they're good and they're perfectly adequate for doing this research and others have said well there may be some problems with those lines and there may be some question of is exactly how many different ones there are and so forth and just how how significant a restriction is it do you think to say at least as far as the kind of research will be funded by the federal government to say you're limited to dealing with existing stem cell lines. Right. That's you know it's it's it's good to try and take this apart like this and that. There are at the moment said to be 22 viable lines. But again I'm talking to stem cell scientists and many of them feel some of them because they were made. These are we're talking about the first major

stem cell lines. They were made before Bush's statement in August of 2001. So there are older and many feel there could be dug dug a month. The other problem is that to grow these early stem cell lines you use a nother type of cell called the feeder cell it's like a sort of a nursemaid cell and the feeder cells that these stem cells were mixed up with are from rodents and. And the feeling is that they possibly could be carrying viruses. So all those lines that are usable unfortunately you know perhaps will and can never be used in the Clinton political setting. And the other thing is there is the chance that the older the stem cell line the more it its genes the genes inside those cells might pick up mutations you know.

And so and the finally there's the last point that those 22 lines are like from 22 different people and they only have so 22 different genetic profiles that they represent. And part of the beauty of stem cell research in the future will be to try and examine cells from all different genetic profiles to understand how those stem cells are contributing to to visit diseases. And that can't really be done with such as a narrow window of genetic profiles. Well I have several callers and I promise I'm going to get to. People I want to make them wait forever let me just though ask one further question. If things continue like this and for any people who are going to be doing their work with federal money they're going to have to live with those restrictions that is only working on existing lines or at least they know they can do work with adult stem cells that are the issue is the

embryonic that then for anybody who is for private industry for researchers that are being funded by by private sources they're free to do whatever research they like. Are there what are the implications you think that the private sector for them. There are no limits on the kind of research that they can do and does. I'm thinking about the fact that you know their their motive ultimately is making money. Yeah and I mean that's what a lot of people in the academic i.e. public sector are are nervous about scientists in the public sector are nervous that not enough of this stem cell research that's happening in the private sector is going to be known and under and put forth for public inspection. The companies that are doing it don't they aren't like acar academic researchers they don't have to write reports and papers all the time which is kind of part of the public. You know what goes

on the public research field. So it's hidden from view much more. And there's so much going on with this biology I think the more that everybody non-scientists especially can understand the better for the future of medicine we have as our guest in this part of focus 580 and Parson She's a science writer. She's covered a number of different topics in science and medicine. She's the co-author of a book about Also AMR's disease which is titled decoding darkness the search for genetic causes of all Simers disease that was published in 2000. She is also the co-author of a book about menopause and that's the title in a pause. She's written for various publications Boston Globe New York Times the Harvard Health Letter. She's taught at Boston University's graduate program in science journalism. And is the author of a book that looks at stem cells and their promise for medicine that's the subtitle. Her book is titled The Proteus effect and it is published by the Joseph Henry press it's out now if you want to read it. Questions are welcome 3 3 3 9 4 5 5. Toll free 800 to 2 2 9 4

5 5. We have several Up next is a caller in Charleston and there would be a line one. Hello. Yes I caught onto your metaphor and building as a amateur carpenter I know if you don't use enough too much material your building falls down. And that that is very potent I think. My two part question the work that is going on and its relationship. To. Capitalism which we live under and then up the road you know George Bush can't last forever or people such as himself or the extreme right wing that battle's you know that I love the comment by I think one of the ladies from now said that of Ronald Reagan he believed in life before birth but not after. And which is apropos. And if it isn't the science then can get the head of the

prejudice and we still have capitalist hoops to go through. And since our 44 million people who have no health care insurance and limited they have a liability. There are a large attempt at stem cell research unit which benefits a man who in my view will just be given out to those who can come up with the money to pay and that this flies in the face of science. You know the science and technology is just something that that is a great thing in modern times but we need to think of its use and its benefits applied to. All of humanity and all love rang off from the snow in the morning radio. THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU. That's that's such an important point. And. And so much is happening as I as I mentioned with biology getting deeper and deeper into the cell into its genes and having all this marvelous ideas

of where we might go with medicine and at the same time you know in other parts of the world having just terrible poverty and and still terrible you know disease you know. I totally agree I think we have to push forward into a new field into a new realm however because it's beckoning to us. And it's also I really feel the stem cell medicine is frankly more common sensical and natural way about medicine than the end of a pharmaceutical. We've been pursuing Thank of all that money that's wasted in the pipeline so often that money doesn't pan out just thousands of billions millions billions wasted. So I just think we have to keep going down this road and see what we find and hope that this or that this gets somewhere and that it will help everybody in the world. Let's go to Champaign County. Color Line to hello.

Hi you you already asked my question I guess in a way because I was going to ask you to explore and I've actually heard on MacNeil-Lehrer proponent of stem cell research recently make the argument that you know we shouldn't have this kind of research going on without the kind of public viewing that and insight and peer reviewing et cetera that that's possible. So that point's been thoroughly made now but I think it hasn't been made enough and I just I just can't figure out why a Christian fundamentalist would say it's OK if the corporations do it for money but if and I don't want any my money doing it I mean if it's morally repugnant for it to be done in a certain way when they want to have it have it. You know subject to review. Another point is there's another courageous woman going around with the story and she was interviewed while our host was on vacation was quite a good one. X. Chair editor of The New England

Journal of Medicine and she points out that corporations are very used to subverting public publicly funded research the in the middle of the Reagan era. There was some a bill that allowed you know it's socially paid for research to be privatized basically and they're used to that and maybe that you know that's why they would hold back and not do the research so they're doing some. But you know they're very used to being at the public trough and letting the government as it as the expression goes. It's socializing the cost and privatizing the profit. And that's a bit of a digression and I but since you asked my question I thought I would go ahead and mention that thank you. Well thank you. Well do you want to go any further with that. Well you know he just it's such an important point about always being visible to

everybody. And partly because science is so wonderful in biology these days and so wonderful an interesting thing can take us away from so many ugliness in the world and that it and it does need to be out there where everybody can appreciate it. To Chicago. It's line number for toll free line. Well I guess there was two points that I wanted to make with regard to the stem cells that you ation. One is that you know in terms of talking about the adult stem cells that were discussed earlier that there have been significant successes with the adult stem cells in terms of actual experimental treatments on on human beings that if they've shown great promise whereas with the periodic stem cells that there's been virtually no successes at all and you know or in most cases not even any attempts in terms of doing anything with human genes because of the fact that there's so much danger as was mentioned by an earlier caller regarding the effect of actually tumor

growth being generated from the use of stem cells which is what's been happening with the the animal experiments has been done. So in that sense the the concept of federal money being used for adult stem cells seems to be you know where the more promise is at least at this time and that therefore it would be from the taxpayers point of view logical to say that it be more desirable to have the the funds used in a more productive manner by going after. Something that seems to have significant success the other ethic which has not been mentioned is if if assuming that we did discover that the embryonic stem cells were something that was capable of resolving these problems that currently are being faced that the the fact of the tissue rejection issue which was mentioned earlier suggests that it basically leads us into human cloning because the only way that you can manage to get compatible tissue for it for doing this is basically to clone an embryo from the human if you want to treat it to get the

compatible tissue and then extract the stem cells. And to do that you have to get a source of human eggs from which you can do the cloning process and actually that is the big challenge that is being totally ignored is the fact that where with these all these human eggs come from that would be needed to generate the starting point treatment so that you could manage to generate these clones and actually do do the treatments and effectively it would be millions and millions of eggs needed then you'd have to basically go through an aggressive medical procedures to women to be able to harvest the eggs so that effectively that other people could be treated it would be a nightmare. Well first I have to leap in and say that one of the you know there they bring in embryonic stem cells they sort of coax them down certain lineages and one of these went into St.. Think coaxed into recently is in into exile so that you can take an embryonic stem cell and coax it toward becoming egg cells and so you know if that if that pans

out and if those are ok week that could be the source that you're saying is missing. Well I guess that could be but at this point that's just it. So all or all of this is futuristic. A lot of it a lot of it is futuristic and I basically think that as a yes the embryonic stem cell hasn't been used yet again because it's such a new finding. And they're just working with it in the dish show far they're trying to figure out how to make it into a heart cell or up to cell or a skin cell. And then there's terrific research going on to try and figure that out. Again it's only you know six year old and six year old so far process. We already have with the adoptive souls of those that have been successfully like turned into our tissue and successfully treated patients so effectively if we already have success there why would we. And it works why would we why would we say that we need to walk down a road to get the same result.

Well there are lots of doubts about a possibly I've heard lots of out about the adult stem cell. The very fact that it's committed already to an organ or a system means that it's probably not going to divide and doesn't divide as well as embryonic stem cells. You want a sort of a fount a continuous fount for cells with the embryonic stem cell can do to churn out all the millions of millions upon millions of mature cells that you're going to need for transplantation purposes. And there just is the feeling from what I'm hearing that the adult stem cell can't do that can't make up those out as has been raised is that the embryonic stem cells possibly can cause tumors. But a lot of cases they aren't saying that in the in the very early trials here sort of the early research. So I would want to thank the caller for for his questions I need to jump in here because we're getting into our last 15 minutes and I have a. Couple of other people I want to get to but one quick question like to

ask here as a sort of a compromise between those people who really advocate full out embryonic research and those people who say we shouldn't do that at all. Some people said well you know we do have this pool of embryos that could be used and all of these of these embryos that were there were produced for in vitro fertilization for couples who are having a difficult time conceiving and that they already exist and so some people make the argument said well there there exist we might as well use them and put those to some positive use the ones that are in in frozen storage now and theoretically either would stay that way. Forever or eventually be destroyed. How much would that add to the pool of available material. So the eggs if we added those to the existing lines that we have it's already been it's already adding and there was a report in Perth of fertility

sterility not long ago. I guess a year ago that said there were about nearly half a million left over in vitro fertilization embryos just in this country and in freezers. Now what's happening for instance at Harvard University Harvard is and is teamed up with an Indian vitro fertilization clinic on the outskirts of Boston Boston IVF it's called and and they are taking the leftover embryos that couples are saying OK it's OK to use these towards research and they're turning those into cell lines. Harvard reported 17 new stem cell lines again this is through private money. So this is how they can do it. They reported 17 new lines. About half a year ago and they're making more I believe as we speak. All right let's get some other callers here Abana both of them are abandoned. First line number one.

Who are we to invite her over provincial law in this country storm when you know what's going on in other countries such as Britain and France and the industrialized countries. Oh I'm really glad you brought that up because if it is we are prevent chillen. It's look good to look abroad. It's interesting. Hong Kong and London are countries that search through their thoughts very early on whether to use leftover embryos from in places that were made in a dish or whether to use those for stem cell research and to harvest their stem cells. And they came to the conclusion in both countries countries that the embryos that are especially under Day 14 which they 14 is kind of an important date for an embryo because it begins getting its very very first set of neurology and. It starts dividing into

different layers. But an embryo as young as day 5 was not seen to be a person. And because of those leftovers we're just going to languish there. Why not use them so there's. In those countries for instance it's a it's a go I had in largely in the countries that are have are catholic have a predominantly Catholic. There's been a holding back about using them but just recently France which is a predominantly Catholic country said OK we're going to go ahead and use those leftover embryos and they are going to had I believe that the law starts up next August 2005. Right thank you. Let's go to line two. This is also someone that in Urbana Illinois. I'm a researcher at University of Illinois as you know although I'm not involved with the research or anything like that. But I would like to point

out two things in this debate. Of funding and how to fund research I did I think with with it is that misrepresented in previous caller's comments. There is I want to too to point out that if we think that that stem cells embryonic stem cells were only discovered or isolated in 1998 this is this is not a very long in terms of research in fact just barely a second over a century if we can talk in terms of images. I would claim that we we really don't know now the potential of these cell lines and having these debates right now in terms of potential is really much too early to to have an informed debate on that. And we really need to basic research. The second thing is is that the question of private money private money is driven by bottom line. If the private

institutions can do. Make money out of research. Well they're not going to do the research. This is why our society needs to do this. The public research the best example for that is malaria as a potential. And we've had the potential for several years to save millions of lives all these lives going through poor countries and we don't have the drugs right now to save these people because then it would not be able to pay for these. But these these these drugs and cures. So again this research needs to be done in the public domain. There's it's we can drive and discover the potential of the. Oh my God like I'm glad you said all those things. All right well I think that God very much and if anybody else wants to go here real quick we can certainly get in one caller at least possibly to our guest by the way. And Parson She's a

science journalist and has authored a book on stem cell research it's titled The Proteus effect and it's out in bookstores now if you want to read it too. I'm just curious to go back to pick up a point about whether For purposes of acceptance it really makes a big difference where the stem cells come from and think about the fact that you know if you're going to take something and put it into somebody's body the best the best thing is that you get it from them to start. And then the next best thing is to get it from someone. Is genetically just as close to them as you possibly can get. Is is that the issue of essentially rejection particularly in important issue with the stem cell and does that indeed give add more weight to the idea that maybe it would be we would have that problem if what we were doing we using was adult stem cells that we got from that the person who is going to be the subject of the treatment. Yeah well that would work all the time there. Not necessarily can use their own

cells because their own cells might be diseased. But it isn't a rejection is a huge point hare and it's a reason for something called therapeutic cloning which is the idea of it's kind of amazing thing that and I'm sure a lot of the listeners that have read about it and it's just taking. For instance a skin cell from from the patient taking the nucleus of the skin cell out. And they basically are causing an embryo to grow up by. I'm sorry I've taken the nucleus out and putting it into an egg cell the egg cell creates the climate for the nucleus to start growing like an embryo. So back up you're taking one cell and growing an embryo up from that one cell from that patient. And so that it gives the patient all their own cells to use for for therapy. Yeah.

Well that and I guess so as an earlier caller mentioned this does feed us back into the debate about cloning even though this is a different kind of cloning there is what is referred to as reproductive cloning which in which the idea is to get an entire individual. Then there is therapeutic cloning which is what you've just described here is to get get a small bit and use that in a kind of a therapy. Yeah. Stem cell groups are trying to get rid of the word cloning when it comes to therapeutic cloning because it gives the wrong idea that we're growing somebody up to be a full human being when we aren't. It's basically they would only grow the embryo up today five or six only just to get those stem cells inside it that would be a genetic match for the patient. One more call or at least having him lined for well for a long Hello. I could you briefly discuss where we stand with with stem cell research and spinal spinal cord injury. And I'll listen off the line. Thank you. That's something a lot of people are thinking about just because of the passing of

Christopher Reeve you're in Alaska right. As you know there are so many people who are going to you know be mourning Kammen and missing all we have to say because he was such an inspiration for sports and regeneration medicine certainly the. Spinal Cord Injury is very complex. A much more complex than just breaking a bone what happens. You aren't just breaking nerves but your all and may mean one type of neuron but you're also. Ruining a different type of cell that helps smile and make the nerves. So there are many different things that need to be patched up so to speak. There are all sorts of different things that researchers stem cell researchers are are are looking into. They're looking they're headed in many different directions. Some are trying to transplant neurons straight into the injury. Others are trying to transform

plant the re Mylan 100 cells and it's actually been shown that mouse embryonic cells in the dish can be coaxed into becoming motor neurons which. And when transplanted these cells when transplanted into the spinal cord they actually survive and can send out excellent axons towards muscle. But we're still a very long ways off I think the exciting thing is that there's a possibility for the first time ever that this could work someday. Well I think about at this point we're going to have to finish because we've come to the end of the time I want to again say for people who are interested in reading more on the subject you can look for the book that we've mentioned a couple times it's titled The Proteus effect stem cells and their promise for medicine by our guest Ann parson. It's published by the Joseph Henry press. She's a science journalist who's written for a Boston Globe New York Times Harvard Health Letter. Other publications and the book is out now and books are also you might be interested in her book that she coauthored decoding darkness the search for the genetic causes of all Simas

disease that was published in 2000. And Miss Parsons thanks very much for talking with us it's been such a thoughtful discussion and thank you for having me.