STEM CELL RESEARCH

A Report

AILEEN T. JANSOR

JOMAPLE B. OCENA

Communication 2 – K

21 January 2011
 When a starfish lost one of its arms, it has the capacity to revive the lost part of its
body. Humans, like the starfish, share the ability to regenerate missing parts of the body.
Even though we can’t literally replace a missing leg or a finger, our bodies are regularly
regenerating blood, skin, and other tissues. It was during the 1950’s when the experiment
and development on the bone marrow transplantation led to the discovery of Stem Cells –
the powerful cells that allow us to regenerate certain tissues of the body. This discovery
raised hope in the medical potential of regeneration. “For the first time in history, it
became possible for physicians to regenerate a damaged tissue with a new supply of
healthy cells by drawing on the unique ability of stem cells to create many of the body’s
specialized cell types” (National Academies, 2008). This property makes stem cells
interesting to scientists to break the valise of multiple ailing organs and tissues by
creating a new medical treatment using a viable homegrown replacement for the hope of
saving the lives of many patients.

Based on the research of National Academies (2008), stem cell is a single cell that
can replicate itself or differentiate into many cell types that carry out specific roles of the
body, such as skin, blood, muscle, and nerve cells. Over the past two decades, scientists
have been gradually deciphering the processes by which unspecialized stem cells become
the many specialized cell types in the body. Stem cells can regenerate themselves or
produce specialized cell types. This property makes stem cells appealing for scientists
seeking to create medical treatments that replace lost or damaged cells.

There are two basic types of Stem Cells: embryonic stem cells and adult stem
cells. These stem cells can be found in all of us, from the early stages of human
development to the end of life. These two types of Stem Cells may prove to be useful for
medical research, but each of the different types offers both promise and limitations.
Embryonic stem cells are obtained from fetuses or embryos, and adult stem cells are
found in both children and adults. While adult stem cells can be turned into a limited
number of other kinds of cells, embryonic stem cells have the ability to differentiate into
over two hundred cell types (Skancke , 2009).

Embryonic stem cells, which can be derived from a very early stage in human
development, have the potential to produce all of the body’s cell types. Every cell in the
human body can be traced back from the union of egg and sperm. The fertilized egg that
came into existence will form a blastocyst. Blastocyst is “a five day old embryo which is
smaller than the period at the end of this sentence. It has no identifying features or hints
of a nervous system” (Weiss, 2005). Inside a blastocyst is an inner cell mass which is
composed of 30-34 cells that are referred to by scientists as pluripotent because they can
differentiate into all of the cell types of the body. Some cells forming the inner cell mass
are transferred to a culture dish lined with feeder cells. After culturing and replating for
several months, these cells might maintain their self-renewing ability without
differentiating into specialized cells, and give rise to Embryonic Stem Cell lines that
could, in theory, replicate forever (Ho, Hoffman, & Zanjani, 2006).

“Scientists have been long dreamed of plucking those naive cells from a young
human embryo and coaxing them to perform in sterile isolation” (Weiss, 2005). Then, it
was later than 1998 when embryonic stem cells hit the spotlight when a group of
scientists from University of Wisconsin-Madison led by James Thompson successfully
developed the first human Embryonic Stem Cell lines by isolating cells from the inner
cell mass of early embryos (Kelly, 2007).

According to the National Academies (2008), a blastocyst has two paths to go,
either to continue on a normal development or use for stem cell research. In normal
development, the blastocyst would implant in the wall of the uterus to become the
embryo and continue developing into a mature organism. Its outer cells would begin to
form the placenta and the inner cell mass would begin to differentiate progressively into
200 specialized cell types of the body. When the blastocyst is used for stem cell research,
scientists remove the inner cell mass and place these cells in a culture dish with a
nutrient-rich liquid where they give rise to embryonic stem cells. Some find embryonic
stem cell research to be morally objectionable, because when scientists remove the inner
cell mass, the blastocyst has no longer the potential to become a fully developed human
being.

After removing the inner cell mass from the blastocyst, scientist should keep the
cells healthy. A healthy cell means it keeps on dividing and differentiating into
specialized cells. Scientists can induce embryonic stem cells to replicate themselves in an
undifferentiated state for very long periods of time before stimulating them to create
specialized cells. This means that just a few embryonic stem cells can build a large bank
of stem cells to be used in experiments. However, such undifferentiated stem cells could
not be directly used for tissue transplants because they can cause a tumor-type called a
Teratoma. To be used for therapies, embryonic stem cells would first need to be
differentiated into specialized cell types (National Academies, 2008).

There are two sources of Embryonic Stem Cells. First is the In Vitro Fertilization (IVF)
which is the largest potential source of blastocysts for stem cell research. The process of
IVF requires the retrieval of a woman’s eggs via a surgical procedure after undergoing an
intensive regimen of “fertility drugs,” which stimulate her ovaries to produce multiple
mature eggs. When IVF is used for reproductive purposes, doctors typically fertilize all
of the donated eggs in order to maximize their chance of producing a viable blastocyst
that can be implanted in the womb. Because not all fertilized eggs are implanted, this has
resulted in a large bank of “excess” blastocysts that are currently stored in freezers of
different IVF clinics. The blastocysts stored in IVF clinics were proven to be a major
source of embryonic stem cells for use in medical research. However, because most of
these blastocysts were created before the advent of stem cell research, most donors were
not asked for their permission to use these left-over blastocysts for research.

The In Vitro Fertilization (IVF) technique could also be potentially used to produce
blastocysts specifically for research purposes. This would facilitate the isolation of stem
cells with specific genetic traits necessary for the study of particular diseases. For
example, it may be possible to study the origins of an inherited disease like cystic fibrosis
using stem cells made from egg and sperm donors who have this disease. The creation of
stem cells specifically for research using IVF is, however, ethically problematic for some
people because it involves intentionally creating a blastocyst that will never develop into
a human being.

Another source of Embryonic Stem Cell is the process called Nuclear Transfer which
offers another potential way to produce embryonic stem cells. In animals, nuclear transfer
has been accomplished by inserting the nucleus of an already differentiated adult cell—
for example, a skin cell—into a donated egg that has had its nucleus removed. This egg,
which now contains the genetic material of the skin cell, is then stimulated to form a
blastocyst from which embryonic stem cells can be derived. The stem cells that are
created in this way are therefore copies or “clones” of the original adult cell because their
nuclear DNA matches that of the adult cell.

Scientists believe that if they are able to use nuclear transfer to derive human stem cells,
it would allow them to study the development and progression of specific diseases by
creating stem cells containing the genes responsible for certain disorders. In the future,
scientists may also be able to create “personalized” stem cells that contain only the DNA
of a specific patient. The embryonic stem cells created by nuclear transfer would be
genetically matched to a person needing a transplant, making it far less likely that the
patient’s body would reject the new cells than it would be with traditional tissue
transplant procedures.

Although the use of nuclear transfer to produce stem cells is not the same as reproductive
cloning, some are concerned about the potential misapplication of the technique for
reproductive cloning purposes. Other ethical considerations include egg donation, which
requires informed consent, and the possible destruction of blastocysts.

Adult stem cells, which are found in certain tissues in fully developed humans,
from babies to adults, may be limited to producing only certain types of specialized cells.
Adult stem cells are hidden deep within organs, surrounded by millions of ordinary cells,
and may help replenish some of the body’s cells when needed. In fact, some adult stem
cells are currently being used in therapies. They have been found in several organs that
need a constant supply of cells, such as the blood, skin, and lining of the gut, and have
also been found in surprising places like the brain, which is not known to readily
replenish its cells. Unlike embryonic stem cells, adult stem cells are already somewhat
specialized. For example, blood stem cells normally only give rise to the many types of
blood cells, and nerve stem cells can only make the various types of brain cells. Recent
research however, suggests that some adult stem cells might be more flexible than
previously thought, and may be made to produce a wider variety of cell types. For
example, some experiments have suggested that blood stem cells isolated from adult mice
may be able to produce liver, muscle, and skin cells, but these results are not yet proven
and have not been demonstrated with human cells. Recently, scientists have identified
stem cells in umbilical cord blood and the placenta that can give rise to the various types
of blood cells (National Academies, 2008). Nevertheless, scientists are working on
finding ways to stimulate adult stem cells, or even other types of adult cells, to be more
flexible. If they succeed, it could provide another source of unspecialized stem cells.

In conclusion, Stem Cell Research opens the door for the new era of regenerative
medicine and gives hint to the tremendous transformation in the field of modern science.
It is truly the century of cells, the promise of great biomedical breakthrough of our time.
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