Washington Post Story on Stem Cells

Washington Post Story on Stem Cells

This follows from the push by embryonic stem cell research advocates to get a vote on a bill in the Senate soon. The story summarizes some of the issues and background on the bill. Some opponents think that Korean debacle means the science is not what it was touted to be and that the private money being given to stem is sufficient to keep the funding as is. The story says that Bush is expected to veto the bill should it be passed by the Senate. This isn’t really news, but it’s a good statement and summary of the issues.

Pressure on Frist Increases

Pressure on Frist Increases

Embryonic stem cell research advocates continue to put pressure on Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist to bring the Senate bill increasing funding for hESC research to the floor. The publication The Hill reports that there will be a press event this morning with patients who have diseases that are potentially treatable with embryonic stem cell therapies. According to the story, Senator Arlen Specter (R-PA), one of the bill’s supporters, has a “hunch” there will be a vote in June. Frist himself does support the bill.

We’ll see.

Stem Cell Transplant News

Stem Cell Transplant News

Stem cell transplants are commonly used for patients with cancer so that they can receive new blood-producing stem cells after the existing ones are killed by chemotherapy. Patients can receive stem cells from donors, which means there is a possibility of rejection by the body in the form of Graft Versus Hosts Disease (leukemia patients with GVHD are however less likely to have relapses after going into remission than those without), or they can receive their own stem cells back. However, transplants of their own cells have the risk that some cancer cells might be among the ones transplanted back.

A press release from the Canadian company Oncolytics Biotech Inc. announces that the company has patented a method of using a common reovirus to kill the cancer cells in the blood to be transplanted. The virus targets cancer cells with a mutation that has activated the Ras pathway, which occurs in approximately two-thirds of cancer cells. The reovirus’s effectiveness is not exactly new—a study demonstrating it was published in 2003, and the Wikipedia reports that work was done as long ago as 1998—so the press release is an announcement of the patent. I generally tend to disregard patent announcements because, as in this case, the research has been published by the time the patent is granted, but I think this is worth noting because it sounds as though a therapy may be close to being established. This is probably one of the more common applications of stem cell research in existing medicine, and being able to reduce the re-incidence of cancer would be an important step.

This is not a cure-all, of course, and I can see some immediate areas for follow-up research. More and more research is indicating that cancer is caused by a stem cell gone wrong, which then differentiates and proliferates into cancer cells. Eradicating the cancer cells doesn’t mean that the defective stem cells are gone, and they can keep on pumping out new cancer cells. So a blood transplant would have to eliminate any cancer stem cells as well as actual cancer cells to really eliminate the risk. I’m wondering what sort of work has been done applying viruses to stem cells themselves. Could a therapy be developed that uses a virus to target the stem cells? Would it be more effective as a virus that kills the stem cell or as a virus that carries altered DNA and repairs the mutation? Anybody out there know? I did a quick Google search of stem cell virus and promptly got a lot of articles way over my head—the research required for me to get an answer will take more time than I have for this blog post.

Catholics Support Adult Stem Cell Research in NJ

Catholics Support Adult Stem Cell Research in NJ

That’s kind of one of those stating the obvious headlines, but it’s actually one of the top news stories of the day. A Newark Star-Ledger story which uses material from the AP reports that Catholic HealthCare Partnership of New Jersey and the New Jersey Catholic Conference will be encouraging the donation of cord blood and placental stem cells in the state’s 15 Catholic hospitals. The requests will be spread through church parishes. The Catholics hope to increase the research that can be done on adult stem cells as an alternative to embryonic stem cell research. They were joined in the initiative by two state lawmakers who support all forms of stem cell research, including embryonic; the Catholic representatives of the groups and the legislators said that they wanted to focus on areas of agreement rather than on their differences. This is thte first partnership of its kind in the country. The Philadelphia Inquirer also covers the story.

In other New Jersey news, Governor Jon Corzine is touring East Asia. In Hong Kong yesterday, after a tour of the University of Hong Kong Medical School, Corzine called for ties between China and New Jersey, according to the Trenton Times. Corzine is busy promoting New Jersey as a place for international collaboration on stem cell research due to its biotech businesses.

I’m all for adult stem cell research, though not to the exclusion of embryonic stem cell research. I don’t think embryonic stem cell research should exclude adult stem cell research either. I think these different kinds of cells have different things to teach us and both need to be studied thoroughly.

Sorry about yesterday's no posts

There was little news in the morning, and then my DSL was down all afternoon. However, not much was missed--most of the stories that came through were the incontinence news. It's a little slow today so far too, but I'll see what I can piece together.