Home | Contact Us | Newsletters

A week in politics is a long time, but  stem cell science is moving even faster than politics.  On June 7,  journals Nature and   Cell  published three papers reporting on a simple method of turning mouse skin cells into  "pluripotent" stem cells which function like embryonic stem cells in that they can be turned into any kind of   cell.  These stem cells were obtained without cloning or  destroying embryos and without the use of eggs or sperm. 

Shinya Yamanaka of  Kyoto University, who pioneered the technology, described  his work at the   International Stem Cell Conference in Cairns in June.  "It's easy, there's no magic" he said.   He took a mouse skin cell and introduced four small proteins which reprogrammed the cell's nuclear DNA to make it pluripotent,   like embryonic stem cells.  "Pluripotent" cells have the potential to grow into any kind of cell. 

Yamanaka's work should take the wind out of the sails of the cloning industry, which has claimed  the only way to get  embryonic stem cells  exactly matching a patient is by cloning because the cloned embryo is the patient's identical twin.  But if  an identical match can be achieved by Yamanaka's reprogramming of skin cells,  cloning becomes pointless.   

For years  stem cell researchers sought to obtain  embryonic stem cells through nuclear transfer - transplanting an adult cell's nucleus into an egg emptied of its  own nucleus,  and then trying to trigger cell division to produce an embryo.   Such cloning requires  the donation of eggs from women  - dangerous for the women - and is an expensive,  difficult technique even in animals.    It has not  been achieved with human cells.    

By contrast, Yamanaka's work takes the research out of the arena of the cloning industry and into the field of molecular and cell biology where Australia has considerable expertise.   

The Nature commentary  entitled "Simple switch turns cells embryonic"  says "The race is now on to apply the surprisingly straightforward procedure to human cells.....  The method is inviting. Whereas cloning with humans was limited by the number of available eggs and by a tricky technique that takes some six months to master, Yamanaka's method  uses  basic cells and can be accomplished with simple lab techniques." 

Even  Alan Trounson,  ubiquitous spruiker for cloning and embryo experimentation,  conceded: "This is great science.  It takes us a big step closer to reprogramming adult cells." 

Yamanaka  was an orthopedic surgeon before switching to research.     With a small team  early  in 2004 Yamanaka  worked up a list of 24 possible genes he thought were instrumental in cell programming.  Using retroviruses to deliver the genes into mouse skin cells, Yamanaka and   one of  his students,  Takahashi,  eventually narrowed the number down to four active genes that triggered the transformation. 

That the process proved so straightforward surprised  Yamanaka. Scientists  assumed that reprogramming would  require a complex arrangement of far more genes. "We were very surprised," he says.   Nervous after the Hwang fraud debacle, Yamanaka  had another researcher repeat Takahashi's work.    When he published his results in Cell in August 2006, he took the unusual step of including every bit of lab data in the supplementary section of his paper. 

Although  Yamanaka's  laboratory is small and  doesn't have access to the vast funds available in the USA,  he  hints  they may have more breakthroughs in store: "I think that this year or next year we could see reprogramming in human cells.  I really believe it could come from our lab." 

Breakthroughs  as achieved by Yamanaka are a strong indicator that we should not expend any funds on cloning and experimentation on human embryos.  There is continuous good news of promising results from  adult stem cells, and clinical trials and treatments with  stem cells  from  umbilical cord blood, which is safely and painlessly collected after the birth of a baby.    

Cord blood stem cells  are already  used to treat  leukemia  and other blood diseases, but researchers are researching  the use  of  these cells in the treatment of heart, liver and pancreatic diseases. Particularly promising is  a trial in the US where children with Type 1 diabetes were treated with their own cord blood.  It lowered their glucose levels  and reduced their need for insulin. 

Periodically one reads reports in the papers about trials with embryonic stem cells to treat spinal injuries.  These reports should be challenged and the reporters or scientists touting them should be asked if the US  Food & Drug Administration (FDA) has given approval for the trial.   If they claim they have actual results,  ask where their paper has been  published and request a copy.  Professor   Keirstead of the Christopher Reeve-Irvine Research Centre  in California, who also was at the International Stem Cell conference in Cairns has talked about using "purified" oligodendrocytes and  other glial precursors from embryonic stem cells,  but the risk is that  these differentiated cells from embryos  could revert to their embryonic state and cause tumours.   

Not only should we avoid unethical and destructive  experiments with  human cloning, but  any Australian punter would advise  politicians not to put taxpayers' money on horses with poor or no performance.   In feeding the hyped hope of ESC scientists, we are actually taking away from real success for patients now, as buttressed by real facts. It would be interesting to know in what kind of  stem cell research Bracks and Brumby invested our money on their  visit to California.