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(wz) From what is now considered medical waste might be fashioned bio-treasure: stem cells able to form into any of the body’s 220 cell types, including blood, nerves, bone, and skin tissue, new research suggests.
Scientists at Children’s Hospital Boston have forged stem cells from the “flawed” and “poor quality” early-stage embryos that in vitro fertilization clinics discard by the hundreds of thousands every year, according to research published yesterday in the journal Nature Biotechnology.
These are embryos created by IVF technicians but culled because abnormalities make them unsuitable for implantation into the wombs of women unable to conceive naturally. The embryos, usually containing no more than a few score cells, are deemed medical waste and simply tossed away.
Such embryos can “provide a reliable source for embryonic stem derivation,” said Dr. Paul H. Lerou, lead author of the study and a neonatologist at Children’s and Brigham & Women’s Hospital. more…

From: »The Boston Globe«

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 29th, 2008 at 08:00 by Werner Zapf and is filed under General, Industry, r & d. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.