In the Aug. 23, 2006, issue of Nature, scientists from the Worcester, Mass.-based company Advanced Cell Technology reported on deriving stem cells from human blastomeres with a single-cell biopsy technique that is used in in vitro fertilization clinics to assess the genetic health of preimplantation embryos.

In the work, which is carried out on human embryos but was similar in many respects to animal research reported in October by Advanced Cell Technology, the researchers used single cells obtained from embryos left over from in vitro fertilization procedures. They obtained 19 stem-cell outgrowths and two stable human embryonic cell lines; the cell lines were genetically normal and able to form cells from each of the three embryonic germ lines, and cells that have therapeutic value including retinal pigment epithelial cells.

No More Creative Destruction

Advanced Cell Technology sees the work as an ethical breakthrough: "Right now, this is the only technology that exists that allows us to derive embryonic stem cells without harming the embryo," senior author and vice president of research and scientific development Robert Lanza told BioWorld Today.

But some bioethicists are skeptical that the paper will change much, either for the two-thirds of Americans in favor of embryonic stem cell research or for the one-third opposing it. "This is a colossal miscalculation on ACT's part," said Glenn McGee, who is the director of the Alden March Institute for Bioethics in Albany, NY. He also is editor-in-chief of The American Journal of Bioethics and was once on Advanced Cell Technology's ethics advisory board. "Their idea is that this is going to appease the people who oppose the research, and that's just not going to fly. From the point of view of the pro-life movement, this is like taking an unconsenting research subject and sucking out an eighth of its body."

(In the paper, ACT wrote that "until remaining doubts about safety are resolved, we do not recommend this procedure be applied outside the context of [pre-implantation diagnostics].")

Other bioethicists, however, were more optimistic about the work and its ability to sway people. Ruth Fischbach, director of the Center for Biomedical Ethics at Columbia University Medical Centers, noted that for many opponents of stem cell research, the main issue is that embryos are being created with the purpose of destroying them. "From that point of view," Fischbach told BioWorld Today, "the question is, 'Does this procedure create life to later destroy it?' And it appears that it does not."

ACT's Lanza also thinks that there is an important audience that appreciates the ethical improvement of the new method: "There are a lot of people that equate embryonic stem cell research with destroying human embryos," Lanza said. "The president is a case in point."

And indeed he is. Bush has called embryonic stem cell research that destroys human embryos "the taking of innocent human life in the hope of finding medical benefits for others." Lanza said he hopes the new method "would satisfy those concerns."

But he also agreed that the "The Catholic Church, for example, is opposed to in vitro fertilization. So this will not sway them." And Fischbach said that "there is a group that is so totally against the process that it can't even see variations. And it's hard to know how to converse with this group."

Bioethicist McGee said that the proof will be in the pudding for the current skeptics, saying that "the first major cure from embryonic stem cells" will turn those opposed "180 degrees."

If his prediction is false, other possibilities exist to resolve the controversy. Politically, the battle may be over anyway. McGee noted that the battleground over whether to allow embryonic stem cell research with public funds effectively has shifted from the federal government to the states, while Fischbach noted that there already is a majority favoring stem cell research, and that even more people might embrace federal funding if they realized that "federal funding means federal oversight, and federal oversight means that rogue investigators will not be able to carry out unethical research."

Getting Adult Stem Cells To Not Act Their Age

Another possibility is that scientists will manage to coax adult stem cells, which have none of the ethical issues that plague embryonic stem cells, into greater plasticity. Working separately, both researchers at Georg-August University in Goettingen, Germany, and Irvine, Calif.-based PrimeCell Therapeutics have reported that stem cells isolated from adult testes can be reprogrammed to be as flexible as embryonic stem cells. And in a study published in the Aug. 25, 2006, issue of Cell, scientists from Kyoto University in Japan and the Japan Science and Technology Agency in Kawaguchi managed to transform adult fibroblast cells into stem cells with embryonic-like properties by adding a mere four growth factors.

Asked to compare ACT's Nature paper to the research published in Cell, Lanza noted that the work in Cell is animal research - as is, for that matter, the research on testicular stem cells. Referring to the Cell paper, Lanza pointed out that the cells were "extensively modified," including the up-regulation of at least one oncogene. But he also noted that the research has great potential.

"It does suggest that there will be ways one day to create stem cells from scratch," he said.