New treatments for infertile men mean there is a greater risk of the cystic fibrosis mutation being passed on to resulting children, according to Dr Keith A Jarvi of Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto at an American Medical Association briefing last week. Jarvi and colleagues, whose findings are published in...
Doctors at St Elizabeth's Medical Center in Boston (US) have injected engineered DNA into an 81 year old's heart muscles to help restore blood-flow to clogged arteries by using a catheter for the first time - without the use of anaesthesia. Until now, the DNA was was injected into the heart...
Cloned human embryos have been produced by two US biotechnology companies during research aimed at developing tissue transplant therapies, according to a number of reports in the mainstream UK press last week. The California-based Geron Corporation, which effectively bought the right to use the cloning technology developed at the Roslin...
The University of California has settled 107 of the 113 lawsuits resulting from the fertility clinic scandal that rocked the medical centre in 1995. Regents of the university have so far agreed to pay nearly $20m to 107 infertile couples, including those who had their eggs stolen. The remaining six...
In a surprise move, Chiroscience and Celltech - UK's strongest biotechnology companies - announced their £680m merger last week. Celltech Chiroscience will be the UK's largest biotechnology company and the largest pharmaceuticals company after AstraZeneca. The merger is intended to give greater critical mass allowing the two companies to compete with global...
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Slippery slopes and cloning
by Juliet Tizzard
It's only a matter of time before the first human is cloned. Or so we are told. This week's news that two teams in America are competing to produce the first cloned embryo for the development of new therapies, brought with it the familiar cries that cloned babies are just...