Friday, January 13. 2006
Clone the Truth #6
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Dear Rebecca,
Thank you for starting this campaign. Truth is most definitely essential in this very important debate.
If I may make a small suggestion? In paragraph three, you write:
So there is no debate over the fact that embryonic stem cell research destroys the embryo. The debate is whether killing embryos for their stem cells is ethical.
Taken in context, this first sentence is correct. But by itself (which is most likely how you will be quoted by liberal blogs opposing your campaign), it is slightly inaccurate. In the future, a phrasing more like the following would be more accurate:
So there is no debate over the fact that extracting embryonic stem cells from the embryo destroys it.
My only reason for making this suggestion is that I support a method of obtaining stem cells known as transdifferentiation, or somatic cell nuclear reprogramming. Such methods would be able to directly convert, say, a skin cell into an embryonic stem cell without creating an embryo.
I appreciate the honesty you bring to the debate.
Best,
Steven
Thank you for starting this campaign. Truth is most definitely essential in this very important debate.
If I may make a small suggestion? In paragraph three, you write:
So there is no debate over the fact that embryonic stem cell research destroys the embryo. The debate is whether killing embryos for their stem cells is ethical.
Taken in context, this first sentence is correct. But by itself (which is most likely how you will be quoted by liberal blogs opposing your campaign), it is slightly inaccurate. In the future, a phrasing more like the following would be more accurate:
So there is no debate over the fact that extracting embryonic stem cells from the embryo destroys it.
My only reason for making this suggestion is that I support a method of obtaining stem cells known as transdifferentiation, or somatic cell nuclear reprogramming. Such methods would be able to directly convert, say, a skin cell into an embryonic stem cell without creating an embryo.
I appreciate the honesty you bring to the debate.
Best,
Steven
BTW, I am the quadriplegic who wrote the piece you linked on January 9, 2006.
Steven,
Thank-you so much for your comment. You are correct. That would be a better phrase. Also because research on embryonic stem cells does not necesarily have to destroy the embryo. The research could involve existing stem cell lines.
I am honored that you took the time to comment.
Thank-you so much for your comment. You are correct. That would be a better phrase. Also because research on embryonic stem cells does not necesarily have to destroy the embryo. The research could involve existing stem cell lines.
I am honored that you took the time to comment.
Rebecca,
That is true. Fusing enucleated embryonic stem cells with a donor cell has also been shown to generate patient-specific embryonic stem cells. The scientist, Yuri Verlinsky, has not revealed his technique, so he may end up as another Hwang Woo-suk.
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg18625014.100.html
Of interest, PBS's Nova ScienceNOW interviewed George Daley from Harvard University. The subject of transdifferentiation arose. Here is the exhange:
-----
NOVA scienceNOW: So in your opinion, these experiments—which have attracted a lot of media and political attention—don't really resolve the ethical problems. Can you envision something else that could satisfy the ethical concerns?
Daley: What scientists really want to do is learn how to change the skin cell directly into an embryonic stem cell. The method that we use today, nuclear transfer*, reactivates in the skin cell all of the genes that are "on" in the early embryo. We essentially recreate an embryo from the skin cell. That is the problematic part.
There are a number of genes, however, that one could imagine are important for embryonic stem cell function but that don't play a role in the early embryo. If you could make those genes turn on, you might directly turn the skin cell into an embryonic stem cell and not into an embryo. If we can get there, then I think we can satisfy even the very, very conservative and absolutist critics.
NOVA scienceNOW: So the ideal is to take the egg out of the equation altogether? Just go from a regular skin cell to a stem cell?
Daley: Right. We know today that we can take a skin cell and, using the environment of the egg, reawaken all of those embryonic genes. But it's just biochemistry. If we could understand what the egg is doing and apply it in the petri dish to the skin cell, that's the Holy Grail—that's what would give us the ability to manipulate the fate of skin cells for medical and therapeutic ends, and get away from some of these more contentious ethical issues.
NOVA scienceNOW: Do we have any idea whether that's possible?
Daley: It's theoretically possible. We know the egg can do it.
NOVA scienceNOW: So if this is theoretically possible, should scientists abandon the more controversial method of using cloning to create stem cells?
Daley: Not at all. I have patients, and I can see a way to apply this technology to study their disease and perhaps treat their disease. I want to be able to use that process today. I don't want to have to take the gamble and wait five, 10, 15 years to figure out how the egg's doing it.
I feel that the goal of treating patients, the goal of attempting to relieve suffering—that more than justifies the ethical concerns. We don't take this approach lightly. There is some potential for human life in these cells. So I don't dismiss all of the considerations. But it's an ethical trade-off, one that I'm very comfortable making.
-----
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/sciencenow/3302/06-cont.html
While Daley does say he supports continuing the current derivation methods, he clearly acknowledged transdifferentiation as the "Holy Grail".
A bill will be brought up in Congress this year, the Respect for Life Pluripotent Stem Cell Act (S.1557), that funds research into methods of obtaining embryonic stem cells that do not harm an embryo. Its sponsors are Senators Tom Coburn from Oklahoma and Jim DeMint from South Carolina. It may be worth keeping an eye on.
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c109:S.1557:
Keep up the good work!
That is true. Fusing enucleated embryonic stem cells with a donor cell has also been shown to generate patient-specific embryonic stem cells. The scientist, Yuri Verlinsky, has not revealed his technique, so he may end up as another Hwang Woo-suk.
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg18625014.100.html
Of interest, PBS's Nova ScienceNOW interviewed George Daley from Harvard University. The subject of transdifferentiation arose. Here is the exhange:
-----
NOVA scienceNOW: So in your opinion, these experiments—which have attracted a lot of media and political attention—don't really resolve the ethical problems. Can you envision something else that could satisfy the ethical concerns?
Daley: What scientists really want to do is learn how to change the skin cell directly into an embryonic stem cell. The method that we use today, nuclear transfer*, reactivates in the skin cell all of the genes that are "on" in the early embryo. We essentially recreate an embryo from the skin cell. That is the problematic part.
There are a number of genes, however, that one could imagine are important for embryonic stem cell function but that don't play a role in the early embryo. If you could make those genes turn on, you might directly turn the skin cell into an embryonic stem cell and not into an embryo. If we can get there, then I think we can satisfy even the very, very conservative and absolutist critics.
NOVA scienceNOW: So the ideal is to take the egg out of the equation altogether? Just go from a regular skin cell to a stem cell?
Daley: Right. We know today that we can take a skin cell and, using the environment of the egg, reawaken all of those embryonic genes. But it's just biochemistry. If we could understand what the egg is doing and apply it in the petri dish to the skin cell, that's the Holy Grail—that's what would give us the ability to manipulate the fate of skin cells for medical and therapeutic ends, and get away from some of these more contentious ethical issues.
NOVA scienceNOW: Do we have any idea whether that's possible?
Daley: It's theoretically possible. We know the egg can do it.
NOVA scienceNOW: So if this is theoretically possible, should scientists abandon the more controversial method of using cloning to create stem cells?
Daley: Not at all. I have patients, and I can see a way to apply this technology to study their disease and perhaps treat their disease. I want to be able to use that process today. I don't want to have to take the gamble and wait five, 10, 15 years to figure out how the egg's doing it.
I feel that the goal of treating patients, the goal of attempting to relieve suffering—that more than justifies the ethical concerns. We don't take this approach lightly. There is some potential for human life in these cells. So I don't dismiss all of the considerations. But it's an ethical trade-off, one that I'm very comfortable making.
-----
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/sciencenow/3302/06-cont.html
While Daley does say he supports continuing the current derivation methods, he clearly acknowledged transdifferentiation as the "Holy Grail".
A bill will be brought up in Congress this year, the Respect for Life Pluripotent Stem Cell Act (S.1557), that funds research into methods of obtaining embryonic stem cells that do not harm an embryo. Its sponsors are Senators Tom Coburn from Oklahoma and Jim DeMint from South Carolina. It may be worth keeping an eye on.
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c109:S.1557:
Keep up the good work!
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