Over and over and over again, we've seen that the promising breakthroughs in stem cell research are coming from scientists investigating adult stem cells. Indeed, beyond promise, adult stem cells are already being used in dozens of different medical treatments that are giving very real, very dramatic help to thousands...right now.
And yet the big money is still being awarded to the "dead end" research that uses human embryos. In fact, in California the millions of dollars appropriated for stem cell research are not allowed to fund any investigations at all that involve adult stem cells. Remarkable.
But though the immorality of embryonic stem cell research hasn't dissuaded the foundations and rich individuals from funding the practice, the scientific realities must, at some point, finally win the day. For instance, here's a report from the U.K. National Stem Cell Network Annual Science Meeting in Edinburgh in which researchers showed progress with a "messaging system" that instructs adult stem cells (ASCs) to contribute to tissue repair in response to chemical signals in the body.
Such a discovery holds great hope for techniques by which ASCs could be "instructed" to repair damaged tissues. Said Professor Cay Kielty of the University of Manchester, "What we have shown is that adult stem cells respond in particular ways to some of the chemical signals in the body. The next stage will be to understand how this messaging system regulates relocation of the MSCs and instructs them to become blood vessel cells. After that, we can look at applying our understanding to develop stem-cell derived therapies for tissue repair."
This research, by the way, was funded by the Medical Research Council of the U.K. And the exciting results were shared openly and proudly at the national meeting of stem cell researchers -- even though the science involved dealt with ASCs and not ESCs.
Couldn't happen in California.
(H/T: Adult Stem Cell Awareness)
