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Monday August 27 08:51 AM EDT U.S. Approves Labs With Stem Cells for Federal Use By NICHOLAS WADE The New York Times The National Institutes of Health (news - web sites) will announce the names today of 10 organizations that possess stem cells eligible for use by federally financed researchers. The National Institutes of Health will announce the names today of 10 organizations that possess human embryonic stem cells eligible for use by federally financed researchers. The list has been keenly awaited by scientists since Aug. 9, when President Bush announced that the federal government would finance research on such cells — which are created by destroying human embryos left over from fertility treatments — but only with cell cultures established before that date. Some biologists expressed considerable skepticism at the time that as many as 60 cell cultures had been established, as the administration said was the case, because only a handful had been described in the scientific literature. According to a document made available to The New York Times, there are 10 universities and companies that derived cell cultures from 64 embryos before the cutoff date, and that have told the National Institutes of Health they will make the cells available to researchers. The list includes four organizations in the United States and six in Sweden, Australia, India and Israel. As to the quality of the embryonic cells, another issue that has worried many scientists, the agency says there is not yet any agreed-upon standard. But it said most of the cells were known to have the right set of proteins, or "markers," on their surfaces, and to be capable of developing into the three separate tissues of the early embryo. Scientists hope that embryonic cells can be used to regenerate the tissues damaged in diabetes, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, heart disease and other diseases. Though the stem cell colonies were all derived from embryos left over from in vitro fertility treatments, opponents of abortion have condemned the research because it requires destruction of the embryos from which the cells are derived. But despite President Bush's months of agonizing over these objections, his administration now appears eager to push ahead with the research as quickly as possible. The National Institutes of Health, the document says, will "ensure that the scientific community has an opportunity to fully and swiftly investigate the promise of human embryonic stem cell research." The N.I.H. is part of the Department of Health and Human Services. Tommy G. Thompson, the department's secretary, has long been regarded as a supporter of this research. The agency says it will make a registry of human embryonic cell lines available on its Web site as soon as possible. Until it does so, scientists will be uncertain whether the cells will be available in sufficient quality and without excessive restrictions. Dr. Paul Berg of Stanford University, a leading biologist who was consulted by the administration, said that until the registry is posted, "it's hard to comment on where things stand." But, he added: "In my view if we have 60 lines that's an enormous opportunity. I think some of the fuss about whether the cells are suitable for therapeutic use is simply premature. I suspect it will take three to five years before anyone is ready to propose a clinical trial." Dr. Michael Ross, chief executive of CyThera, a San Diego company that has derived cells from nine embryos in the hope of curing diabetes, said his scientists needed to study and understand the cells better before making them available to others. The organizations that have derived the human embryonic stem cell lines, and the number of different embryos reported in each case, are: BresaGen, Athens, Ga. (4); CyThera, San Diego (9); the Karolinska Institute, Stockholm (5); the Monash Institute of Reproductive Biology, Melbourne, Australia (6); the National Center for Biological Sciences, Bangalore, India (3); Reliance Life Sciences, Bombay (7); the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa (4); the University of California, San Francisco (2); Goteborg University of Goteborg, Sweden (19); the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation, or WARF, of Madison (5). Researchers have expressed concern that the Geron Corporation of Menlo Park, Calif., which financed the first derivation of human embryonic stem cells at the University of Wisconsin, might control access to the cells or impose unacceptable conditions on their use. But Geron is only a licensee, though an important one, of the patent held by WARF, which has said it wants to make the cells widely available. The only restrictions are that the cells should not be made into viable embryos or used for human cloning. Carl Gulbrandsen, the managing director of WARF, said yesterday that he was negotiating with the N.I.H. over the terms under which the foundation's cells would be made available to the agency's researchers, and that "both of us are pretty confident that this will get done soon and that scientists are going to be happy with it." Some scientists fear that WARF's patent will give it a dominant position, but Mr. Ross of CyThera said his company's lines were derived by an independent method. Mr. Gulbrandsen said that any discussions between the foundation and other derivers over commercial applications needed not affect the distribution of cells to academic researchers. He said that he hoped to reach a research-friendly agreement with the N.I.H., and that if other derivers of the cells did the same, "they don't have to worry about our patents." An administration official said yesterday that the impending publication of the embryonic cell registry "should put a lot of the skepticism to rest." "Basically it's time to go to work and start doing some of the research," the official said. SOURCE: Yahoo Daily News / The New York Times http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nyt/20010827/ts/u_s_approves_labs_with_stem_cells_for_federal_use_1.html * * * ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To sign-off Parkinsn send a message to: mailto:[log in to unmask] In the body of the message put: signoff parkinsn