Cells are the building blocks of living things. A human body is made up of around 100 trillion cells.
The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (RCOG) warned parents in the UK last week against banking the cord blood and umbilical cells from their babies in order to have 'insurance' against future diseases in their children. Scientists and doctors have said that the procedure cannot be justified on scientific...
Scientists in the US announced yesterday that they had created a cloned human embryo for the first time. Their work was part of research into therapeutic cloning - creating cells or tissue for transplant from a person's own cloned embryo and subsequently lessening the risk of rejection. The research team also...
Following the announcement by the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) last week that 64 embryonic stem cell lines have been identified as eligible for use in federally funded projects, it has emerged that some of these cells may be unsuitable for research. Some scientists are claiming that not all...
Following President Bush's announcement last week that a limited amount of stem cell research can take place in the US, a dispute has broken out between a patent agency and a California company involved in such research. The dispute is about future access to stem cell lines. A lawsuit was...
Scientists from Canada's McGill University in Montreal have reported that it may become possible for human skin cells to transform into other types of tissue cells, such as muscle, nerve or fat. The researchers think that stem cells isolated from the lowest levels of skin may eventually be harvested in...
American newspapers have reported a fall in biotech share prices, following President Bush's decision to limit embryo stem cell research to existing cell lines. Despite reassurances from stem cell company executives that the field has a promising future, investors were unable to share the optimism. Geron share prices fell, as...
After much anticipation, President George W Bush has made public his decision on the federal funding of embryo stem cell research. Talking from his home in Texas, Bush said that he would not allow federal funds for deriving stem cells from embryos or for using embryo stem cells newly derived...
Scientists in Israel have reported success in growing human heart cells in the laboratory. The researchers, based at the Technion Institute of Technology and Rambam Medical Centre, Haifa, say that their successful development of immature heart cells called cardiomyocytes from embryonic stem cells is the first of its kind. The...
Doctors from Monash University in Melbourne, Australia, have developed a technique in which no sperm is required to make an embryo. Designed as a method of getting around male infertility, the technique involves taking any body cell and 'fertilising' an egg with it. Body cells, however, contain two sets of...
Scientists at the University of Georgia have cloned eight calves using a new technique. The calves now range in age from two to four months old. The scientists, lead by Steve Stice, say they believe that their new method will greatly increase the efficiency of the cloning process in cattle...
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