Error Sparks Confusion in Cell Debate

[BrentAllen]

packsaddle,

Maybe this is why the Bush Administration objected to the process. Maybe they knew it was false.

 

http://www.ajc.com/news/content/shared-gen/ap/National/Stem_Cell_Confusion.html

 

By MATT CRENSON

September 1, 2006 - 5:35 p.m. EDT

AP National Writer

 

NEW YORK An advance in stem cell research that was intended to resolve moral differences over the promising but controversial field has ignited fresh conflict instead.

 

Because stem cells can turn into virtually any type of human tissue, they hold promise for treating a host of human maladies. But critics have argued that creating the cells for research is wrong because it requires the destruction of human embryos in their earliest stages.

 

Scientists say the field's progress is seriously hampered by federal funding restrictions that are motivated by those moral objections.

 

Last week, the California biotech company Advanced Cell Technology proposed a way out of the impasse. Writing in the scientific journal Nature, ACT researchers described a way to make stem cells from single cells that had been removed from embryos. Because fertility doctors routinely remove single cells from embryos for genetic testing and then successfully implant them, the technique could in theory be used to create stem cells without destroying human embryos.

 

An e-mail sent to reporters by Nature before the paper's online publication stated that company researchers "have been able to generate new lines of cultured embryonic stem (ES) cells while leaving the embryo intact."

 

In reality, however, the embryos used by the company were destroyed in the course of developing the method. The researchers removed an average of five to six cells from each embryo rather than one to improve their chances of success. Removing that many cells at such an early stage of development effectively destroys an embryo.

 

Within hours of the paper's release, the journal issued a pair of clarifications to the original e-mail that corrected the mistake. But several media outlets included the error in their own accounts.

 

The Associated Press' stories did not address the fate of the embryos, instead focusing solely on the technique.

 

Robert Lanza, vice president of research and scientific development at Advanced Cell Technology, said the technique is the important thing, not how it was developed.

 

"The concept and implications of the study remain completely unchanged," he said.

 

Critics of stem cell research said the company had not been sufficiently clear about how their experiments were conducted.

 

"I'm not saying the Nature article was false, but it certainly misled a lot of people," said Richard Doerflinger of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

 

Company officials protested that the fate of embryos in their laboratory has no bearing on the scientific value of the research that comes out of it. Using the techniques they developed, they said, future researchers can create stem cells without destroying embryos.

 

Having such a capability could be useful because U.S. law currently bans federal funding of any research that harms human embryos. In an August 2001 decision, President Bush allowed federal funding for research on the few dozen cell lines that had been created up to that point. But researchers say they need hundreds of lines to move the science forward.

 

"I think the degree of protest here is the result of the importance of this breakthrough," said Ronald Green, chairman of Advanced Cell Technology's ethics advisory board and a professor of religion at Dartmouth College. "If the president were to turn around tomorrow and authorize stem cell lines produced in this way, in two years' time we could have three to four hundred stem cells lines."

 

Other scientists have expressed reservations about the significance of the research, saying that it needs to be confirmed through replication. Many would prefer to keep creating stem cells using the current technology, which requires the destruction of embryos about five days into development. At that stage, they constitute a ball of about 100 to 150 cells.

[packsaddle]

"packsaddle,

Maybe this is why the Bush Administration objected to the process. Maybe they knew it was false."

 

Brent, if you locate a clear statement by the administration explaining their decision, I would like to read it. But the premise you state in the second sentence of your post is incorrect. Aside from AJC articles, have you actually read the Nature articles, the original literature?

 

In case the answer is 'no', I will respond.

Yes, embryos were destroyed during the development of the technique claimed by ACT. ACT is privately funded. They are allowed to do this. Actually they can do pretty much anything they want. There's nothing much you can do about it. The administration has considered this and decided not to oppose private industrial research on human embryos. Like that?

Assuming ACT's newly-developed technique works, however, the technique will allow development of embryonic stem cell lines WITHOUT destruction of embryos. Lanza is correct in his assertion.

 

OK, just in case you didn't understand that, here's what they did (in a 'nutshell'). ACT sacrificed some number of embryos in the 8-10 cell stage by separating one or more cells to develop stem cell lines. Each of the single, separated, pluripotent cells was cultured to allow it to replicate. These replicated pluripotent cells were then used to establish embryonic stem cell lines. Assuming their claim is correct, this is a large advance and here is why.

 

IVF already sometimes employs a technique in which a single cell is removed from the embryo at the 8-10 cell stage. At present this separated cell is used to diagnose the genetic or other status of the embryo and, as I pointed out in the other thread, the intended recipient has the choice to reject embryos that are thusly shown to be defective.

However, if the new ACT technique is applied during this routine IVF procedure, that single pluripotent cell can be allowed to replicate, thus supplying a larger number of copies of itself, all of them pluripotent. These would then be used, employing the ACT technique, to develop the embryonic stem cell line.

The only risk to the actual embryo is the routine IVF procedure that is already in practice. The ACT technique would only apply to the pluripotent cells replicated after a single cell was removed during that routine IVF procedure. I'm sorry, this is as simple as I can make it. But the fact that ACT destroyed embryos during the development of the technique is irrelevant. Lanza is right.

 

As an aside, IVF already involves the destruction of human embryos during that process. It happens routinely at a variety of steps in the process. As a society, we have already given the nod to this and it happens many times in many fertility clinics already. That genie will not go back in the bottle easily.

 

The only persons who can continue to oppose this research on moral grounds, if the ACT technique is implemented, would be the few Catholics who are completely true to their faith, perhaps a few others.

 

But to anticipate one other line of opposition, I offer this.

It is possible that persons will object to the ACT technique because it did involve destruction of embryos during its development. That is their choice. However, the administration has already crossed that line. The administration approved federal funding for research on the existing embryonic stem cell lines ('grandfathering' them in, so-to-speak). And because those lines were established at the expense of embryos destroyed in the process, there can be no rational objection to the new technique on the basis that its development involved destruction of embryos.

The only way to 'moral purity' now would be to terminate federal funding for ALL embryonic stem cell research, including that which was previously approved. Think that will happen?

I'd like to see them try.

Edited part: typos, sorry(This message has been edited by packsaddle)