(의학) 줄기 세포 연구
(의학) 줄기 세포 연구
And years of research. Billions of dollars and promises of new treatments for everything from spinal cord척수 injuries to Alzheimer’s disease. But when? Where America Stands on stem cell줄기 세포 research. It’s been a year since President Obama loosened restrictions on federal funding for embryonic 배아 태아stem cell research. Those stem cells come from unused human embryos배아 at fertility clinics불임 클리닉. And they can be transformed into any type of cell in the body. The hope is scientists will one day be able to replace damaged or defective cells in people suffering from diseases like diabetes당뇨병, Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s. So how close are we? Dr. John Lapook shows us in our series, CBS Reports: Where America Stands.
12 years after the discovery of the human embryonic stem cell, research is finally picking up steam속도를 내다. Over the past seven years, the NIH국립보건원National Institute of Health has more than tripled its investment in stem cell research to over $1 billion. The number of embryonic stem cell lines funded by the government has doubled. More than 200 US companies are researching stem cells. So the report card on stem cells is promising, but incomplete.
Two years ago, scientists found another way to create stem cells from ordinary skin cells. That breakthrough돌파구 lets researchers study diseases in a dish. For example, skin cells from a patient with ALS루게릭병 have been turned into the kind of nerve cell attacked by the disease. For the first time, those living nerves can be studied outside the body to figure out what goes wrong. “It’s amazing. What can you say?” Stem cell biologist Larry Goldstein says studying disease is like investigating a plane crash. “What you’re really looking for is the black box of diseases. What’s the black box of Alzheimer’s disease? What’s gone wrong when the plane started to go down?”
Later this year, Dr. Hans Kierstead of UC Irvine, working with Geron Corporation, will begin the first FDA-approved trial of human embryonic stem cells to treat paralyzed patients within two weeks of injury. In spinal cord injury, the insulation절연처리 coating the wires in the cord is destroyed. Electrical messages from the brain can’t get past the point of injury and function is lost.
Keirstead and his team figured out a way to turn stem cells into this cell. “This is actually the insulating material.” “That’s the insulating material.” It makes insulation for the spinal cord. Millions of these cells will be injected into the damaged area. The hope is by restoring the insulation the spinal cord will work again.