LEARN MORE ABOUT STEM CELL RESEARCH
Learn More About Stem Cells
What Are Stem Cells?
Stem cells are "unspecialized" cells that can generate healthy new cells, tissues, and organs. Embryonic stem cells, as their name suggests, are derived from embryos.
Specifically, embryonic stem cells are derived from embryos that develop from eggs that have been fertilized in vitro-in an in vitro fertilization clinic-and then donated for research purposes with informed consent of the donors.
They are not derived from eggs fertilized in a woman's body. The embryos from which human embryonic stem cells are derived are typically four or five days old and are hollow microscopic balls of cells called blastocysts.
How Can Stem Cells Lead to Cures for Disease?
Many diseases and injuries result from the destruction, damage, or depletion of essential groups of cells within our bodies. For example, diabetes can result from the destruction of insulin producing cells in the pancreas.
Medical researchers believe that stem cells can replace diseased cell populations within patients, effectively reversing the symptoms of a disease and perhaps even curing it.
The most promising kind of stem cells, the so-called "pluripotent" stem cells, are unspecialized cells that have the ability to become almost any type of cell found in adults (The so-called "adult stem cells"do not have this ability.) In addition, new tissues generated by emerging stem cell techniques may be less likely to be rejected by a patient's immune system.
Stem cell research could lead to treatments and cures for many diseases and injuries including: cancer, heart disease, diabetes, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, multiple sclerosis, ALS, spinal cord injuries, stroke, and more than 70 other diseases and conditions. In fact, medical problems that could benefit from stem cell research affect over 128 million Americans.
Why Aren't Adult Stem Cells As Promising As Embryonic Stem Cells for Research?
There are currently several limitations to using adult stem cells for research.
- Although many different kinds of pluripotent stem cells have been identified, adult stem cells that could give rise to all types of cells and tissues have not yet been found.
- Adult stem cells are often present in only minute quantities in the body and can therefore be difficult to isolate and purify.
- They might not have the same capacity to multiply as embryonic stem cells do.
- Adult stem cells may contain more DNA abnormalities-caused by sunlight, toxins, and errors in making more DNA copies during the course of a lifetime.
These potential weaknesses might limit the usefulness of adult stem cells.
Large numbers of embryonic stem cells can be relatively easily grown in culture, while adult stem cells are rare in mature tissues and methods for expanding their numbers in cell culture have not yet been worked out.
This is an important distinction, as large numbers of cells are needed for stem cell replacement therapies.
Embryonic Stem Cell Research is Ethical and Moral
Literally millions of Americans can have their lives transformed and their suffering cured if the promise of stem cell research is realized.
Prior medical advances, such as blood transfusion and organ transplantation, were originally viewed with suspicion by some segments of the public when they were first developed. They are now recognized as standard medical procedures that have saved countless lives.
Thirty years ago, new advances in recombinant DNA technology led some critics to predict the imminent creation of human cloning laboratories and designer babies. Instead, recombinant DNA technology led to the growth of a biotech industry that has created drugs and diagnostic tests for dozens of diseases and that generates billions of dollars in annual revenues.
Fears concerning embryonic stem cell research are similarly unfounded.
Any embryonic research funded by tax dollars will involve fertilized eggs from fertility clinics that would otherwise be destroyed or other donated eggs that are provided with the fully informed consent of the donors. Stem cells are typically extracted from these blastocysts within 12 days. The fertilized eggs, or blastocysts, are a microscopic group of a few hundred cells.
They are NOT fetuses, they are NOT babies, they do NOT have nerve cells or organs - and they will NEVER be implanted into a human womb or become babies.
The stem cell research being conducted in Wisconsin is not human cloning and will never result in the creation of cloned fetuses.
Wisconsin Stem Cell Now, Inc.
4230 N. Oakland Ave. #249
Shorewood, WI 53211-2042
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