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Need Stem Cells? We Got 'Em By Kristen Philipkoski 07:00 AM Mar. 03, 2004 PT Faced with limitations on stem-cell research from the Bush administration, a Harvard scientist has raised his own money and developed 17 new batches of stem cells, which he's offering to any researcher who needs them for just the cost of shipping. In August 2001, President Bush said in a public address that because he believed the research was morally questionable, no federal funds could be used for embryonic stem-cell research. Researchers using government funds would have to use the stem-cell lines that already existed. Bush said at the time that there were more than 60 lines registered with the National Institutes of Health, but that number in reality was closer to 10. Scientists have lamented the predicament, saying researchers in other countries like Japan, Germany and the United Kingdom are leaving U.S. scientists in the dust, and that American researchers are fleeing to those countries to do their work freely. Doug Melton, the Harvard biologist spearheading Harvard's effort, took matters into his own hands. "I and others in the field have found it very difficult to obtain the cells on the NIH registry. Six to nine months would pass (before we got a response)," Melton said. "I sort of gave up on trying a couple years ago and focused my efforts on creating my own." Researchers have encountered various problems when trying to access stem-cell lines from the NIH, Melton said. The lines they want may not be available; the NIH may send the cells with restrictions on what experiments the researchers are permitted to do; the researchers might have to report their progress to the NIH every other day; or the stem-cell line might be very expensive. Melton is motivated by more than just scientific curiosity -- his 9-year-old son has type 1 diabetes, which requires daily insulin injections. Melton shifted gears several years ago after a career of studying the early development of frogs. He saw stem cells as a potential cure for his son's disease. Now, he heads up one of the leading labs in the country, working to create insulin-producing pancreatic beta cells from stem cells. Melton said he's unconcerned about any political connotations his work might have. "I'm not a politician, I think that's obvious, and the mission of my lab and the university is a scientific one. So we shouldn't be concerned about the political aspects of this." Stem cells, taken from 4-day-old embryos, are a mass of about 100 cells with the ability to become any type of cell in the human body. Researchers are working on ways to force stem cells to differentiate into cells potentially useful in therapies -- for example, those that produce insulin to treat diabetes, or neurons to replace those damaged in the brains of Parkinson's disease patients. Melton and his colleagues used private money donated by the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. They extracted the stem cells from embryos donated by the fertility clinic Boston IVF. Seeking out private money is becoming something of a trend among stem-cell researchers. California activists have proposed a $3 billion ballot initiative to finance embryonic stem-cell research. And New Jersey Gov. James E. McGreevey recently allocated $6.5 million of the state's budget to stem-cell research at Rutgers University, and said he hopes to pump $50 million into the research over the next five years. Harvard has launched its own privately funded center on stem-cell research. The effort began as a collaboration with Boston IVF in 2001 -- the fertility clinic would supply Harvard researchers with frozen embryos, left over after in vitro fertilization treatments, that would otherwise have been discarded. The university is now building a new facility to house the Harvard Stem Cell Institute. But until it's finished, Melton and his colleagues have to be careful not to use any federally funded equipment or supplies for their embryonic stem-cell research. "We used a room in a basement not previously used for experiments," Melton said. "It reminds me of when I was in kindergarten and I got a sticker for being a good boy or a bad boy. We put red stickers on boxes we can get materials from if we're doing experiments with these cells. We keep things segregated." The researchers describe their stem-cell lines online in the March 3 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine; the information will also be published in the March 25 print edition of the journal. SOURCE: Wired News http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,62513,00.html?tw=wn_tophead_4 * * * ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To sign-off Parkinsn send a message to: mailto:[log in to unmask] In the body of the message put: signoff parkinsn