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The Ayatollah Drops by the Stem Cell Lab UPDATED!

August 7, 2012 • By • Leave a Comment
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"Ayatollah Khamenei visiting Royan Institute for Reproductive Biomedicine," Instagram via @Khamenei_ir, the Iranian Supreme Leader's Twitter feed. The Royan Institute is Iran's center for stem cell research. Khamenei has just over 5,100 Twitter followers. The image first appeared three days ago. UPDATE: While scrolling through Khamenei's list of followers, the address @USEmbassyIran leapt out at us. Two hours later the State Department's Laura Seal, a spokeswoman, confirmed that the US had rolled out a digital Radio Free Europe-esque effort directed at Iran last December. Called the ... Read More

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Gauging the ‘Yuck Factor’ of Synthetic Biology

September 10, 2010 • By • Leave a Comment

Much of the cutting edge of science today — stem cell research, synthetic biology, genetic modification — suffers from a vague creepiness, a sense among many non-scientists that this stuff just sounds unnatural (if not unethical). David Rejeski, describes it as the “yuck factor,” offering a slightly more technical term. Part of the challenge for the scientific community, though, is that public perception matters; it can influence investor confidence, government policy, research priorities and public debate. And suddenly, such front lines of science seem everywhere. A federal ... Read More

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Working Mice Spun From Skin Cells

July 25, 2009 • By • Leave a Comment

Embryonic cells are no longer the only cells that can produce live offspring. Two separate Chinese research teams reported this week that they have been able to reprogram skin tissue cells of mice into an embryonic-like state. The cells, called induced pluripotent stem cells, were first produced in 2006 by a Japanese research team from Kyoto University. They have long been theorized to have pluripotent abilities (the potential to differentiate into any cell type in the body except placenta) that could be used in future degenerative and genetic disease treatment. But until now scientists ... Read More

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The Non-Stick Stem Cell?

April 10, 2009 • By • Leave a Comment

In a study that has implications for the treatment of Type 1 diabetes and the successful transferring of stem cells, researchers have shown in mice that transplanted pancreatic precursor cells don't come under attack from the immune system when encased in polytetrafluorethylene (also known as PTFE, or by its DuPont brand name, Teflon). The study, by scientists at the Burnham Institute for Medical Research and the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine, appears online in the journal Transplantation. While Type 1 diabetes relies on an autoimmune response that kills ... Read More

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The Discovery of Stem Cells That Generate Fat

October 13, 2008 • By • Leave a Comment

Some stem cells have the ability to build fat, according to a study in the Oct. 17 issue of the journal Cell. Researchers have yet to show whether the cells can renew themselves, but transplants of the progenitor cells isolated from the fat tissue of normal mice can generate normal fat tissue in animals without it. The study results could provide clues to the causes of obesity, which sees an increase in the number and size of fat cells. "The question is: What are the events that lead to that increase?" said researcher Matthew Rodeheffer of The Rockefeller University. "You need to ... Read More

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Stem Cells Located in Pituitary Gland

April 29, 2008 • By • Leave a Comment

The organ, which sits at the base of the brain and secretes hormones that regulate various bodily functions, had long been suspected as a source of stem cells, but this study represents the first time the hard-to-spot cells have been found there. Neuroscientist Grigori Enikolopov, an associate professor at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, and his colleagues genetically engineered mice so that a certain gene expression, associated with neural stem cells, glowed green under ultraviolet light; almost 100 research teams worldwide have used these special mice to help locate adult stem cells in ... Read More

More like this: Health, Science, Today in Mice
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