Professor Bernie Tuch has given us two belly laughs in a single week. First there was his pricelessly incoherent commment celebrating the cloning victory in the Senate - that "this is as significant as the assassination of John F. Kennedy". And now he has given us an after-dinner conjuring show, doing old tricks with seaweed.
His paper, published today to headlines about 'Scientists overcome immune rejection and tumour problems with stem cells', is nothing of the sort. He uses decades-old technology of alginate packaging of cells for reducing immune response, bundles up a few ESCs - which are then rendered irrelevant for any form of tissue therapy, being unable to make contact with any tissue and says, "see, they don't form tumours!"
In fact, his paper gives us no such reassurance, and only reminds us what sleight of hand the cloning lobby has to use to make the public think this fatal flaw in ESC science can be 'got over'. Remember Prof Trounson in 2002 reassuring us that they were just about to 'get over' the immune rejection problem that made ESCs so obviously unusable in cell transplant therapy?
Whatever the public needs to hear, be sure they will be told by the new breed of scientist-lobbyist.
This paper says nothing about embryonic stem cells (ESCs) except what we already know - that these little troublemakers are so dangerous the only option is to lock them up.
Confined to their seaweed padded-cell, the ESCs in Tuch's study still tried to break out as teratoma tumours – that is, they still proliferated into an uncontrolled range of different cell types – but were contained, as Tuch writes, “by limiting the amount of space available for the cells to grow.”
Entirely appropriate, this high-security solitary confinement, for criminal cells so notorious for fatal tumour formation that last month’s study on rat Parkinson’s found that 4 in every 5 rats treated with ESCs formed teratomas.
Tuch’s paper – entirely irrelevant to the question of cloning human embryos - does show one definite finding: that ESCs formed tumours in all the mice they were put in, unless they were wrapped up in seaweed and kept away from the body tissues. So what’s new?
Gee wizz, what a useful technique: restrict ESCs to a little seaweed package to show they can remain entirely useless for long periods of time. And then celebrate the fact that they don't kill the patients.
Or maybe they will anyway, after the seaweed goes soggy and breaks up: 20% of the seaweed capsules using mouse ESCs ruptured and let their dangerous felons loose again.
Tuch's paper celebreates the fact that he can keep ESCs safely locked away in a seaweed strait-jacket, thereby barring them from the only useful work a stem cell should do - getting into and repairing damaged tissue. And all because ESCs can not, and intrinsically never will be able to do such work. Only adult stem cells, as Prof Sherly explained on his recent visit, have the capacity to take up residence in tissues and generate new cells while retaining their own identity. ESCs can only proliferate wildly - unless you first turn them into adult stem cells!
What a shonky science this is, ESCs and cloning; how second rate in every possible way to adult stem cells, which do not form tumours and which are now safely used in many conditions – including direct tissue repair of heart muscle, bone, cornea etc etc. (Journal article refs available).
Tuch's lightweight article does not herald 'The End of the Tumour Problem with ESCs'. It only confirms the intractable nature of that problem. It also confirms the puppy-like enthusiasm of the media for any bone, even with no scrap of meaningful meat on it, thrown to them by the progressive science lobby.
Above all, it confirms by contrast how safe and exciting the ethical alternative is to this futile tinkering with embryos.
Given that “the purposes of cloning can be achieved using adult stem cells” (as our leading adult stem cell researcher, Prof Alan Mackay-Sim, told the Senate hearing), how absurd it is to pursue wacky schemes like trapping ESCs in seaweed to limit their harm, when we could simply use adult stem cells safely and directly from our own tissues!
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3 comments:
Your bias is obvious, you are probably preaching to the converted, and you have missed the point of the article.
The article was not claiming to be a solution in itself, but looking at the possibility for alginate encapsulation as a delivery system for stem cells. This is an end product for delivery after differentiation of the stem cells. A differentiated cell shouldn't form teratomas and would only be at risk of a host vs graft reaction.
There are studies that cells remain viable in alginate islets
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=pubmed&cmd=Retrieve&dopt=AbstractPlus&list_uids=16699465&query_hl=2&itool=pubmed_docsum
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=pubmed&cmd=Retrieve&dopt=AbstractPlus&list_uids=15665609&query_hl=6&itool=pubmed_docsum
exciting times ne pas?
as yet there are no studies as to the break down on alginates and what happens to the products. But obviously these are the kinds of questions that require research.
The media itself over-sensationalises research, but any serious person interested in science knows that breakthroughs and cures are a long way off in any field of medicine. The potential is there.. we need to stop hampering our scientists and let them work.
BTW Im not a scientist, but one who prefers to champion the cause of science, and not see it go backwards due to luddites.
Save your breath, anon. Any scientist involved in research which touches upon David's ethical sensibilities will automatically be written off as a quack by the good doctor. He's not really interested in the science, he's just interested in making sure no one tampers with his precious embryos.
Anonymous, your bias is obvious.
we need to stop hampering our scientists and let them work.
Not if what they're doing is unethical. Which it is.
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