Posted on 08/23/2006 10:59:33 AM PDT by Ernest_at_the_Beach
For PGD, and PGD-comparable removal for stem cell research, normally no more than 8 cells (3 days post-fertilization). Most cells taken for embryonic stem cell research have been taken from blastocysts, which are a little further along -- apparently they're easier to keep going, but it looks like this group has figured out how to get comparable results from earlier cells.
I don't think there's any reason that a blastocyst couldn't survive cell removal just as well as these earlier embryos, but it hasn't been the practice to try to save blastocysts when they're being used to provide cells for research. If PGD is done for the purpose of selecting embryos to transfer into a patient, it has to be done by the 8 cell/3 day stage because results aren't immediately available, and doing the test later would mean the embryos were too far along by the time they could be transferred, to have a good chance of surviving and implanting.
I don't think there's any reason that a blastocyst couldn't survive cell removal just as well as these earlier embryos
The issue isn't blastocyst survival but subsequent developmental progrsm being effected. I'd think there is a good reason to think this may be effected, but both of you have provided info that empirically it doesn't seem to.
Interestingly, it may be that later manipulation would be more deleterious than at this very early pre-implantation stage before any obvious differentiation and before pattern formation begins.
Bump
Very true. There's just so much self-malleability built into these early embryonic cells that they can compensate for a heck of a lot. This is why researchers are so fascinated with the potential of embryonic cells.
Malleability seems to decrease gradually as an organism differentiates and grows. Weird little factoid: in the handful of cases where abdominal/thoracic surgery has been done on fetuses in utero, to correct defects that would likely be fatal before birth if they went uncorrected, the incisions in the embryos heal without scars. Surgery even shortly after birth (and probably in very late stage fetuses) leaves scars. Somewhere along the line, some switch seems to get flipped in all the skin cells, from "heal wounds with normal skin cells" to "heal wounds with scar-type skin cells". If they ever figure out how to flip that switch back without causing other serious harm, the implications for victims of disfiguring injuries and burns would be immense.
No one has yet been able to take a single removed cell from an embryo and coax it into developing into a baby. But even if they eventually do, so what? What happens when medical science reaches the point where it is capable of taking any human cell and turning into an embryo which can develop into a baby? Does that mean that every cell in our bodies is a potential new human being and that the destruction of even one cell therefore becomes murder?
Researchers are still destroying human life but giving it a different name. The source embryos are not implanted in a uterus, so they die. Human life is still being destroyed. Adult stem cell research where all the successful cures and treatments are coming from does not kill human life.
So you are making a research judgement?
You are welcome. I am not convinced that this is a viable option for the research, but time will tell. I am hopeful that this research can bridge the gap between the potential of embryonic stem cells and the right to life for the innocent embryo. I have a grandfather suffering from Alzheimers, so I have been very interested in the potential of both adult and embryonic stem cells. Any benefits will be too late to help him, but I would love to keep others from the same fate.
I just can't see taking an innocent life as justifiable for any reason. This research at least indicates that we are working toward the right goal.
Thanks for the very informative discussion. That was great!
I have a family member which could be helped with a break through. To date, I've been fully behind Adult stem cells and very opposed to embryonic. This may open a new avenue and the researcher's should be commended for attempting to find a way to preserve life.
I still think the MSM has given the adult stem cells the 'short end of the stick' in their coverage, but what else is new.
which = who - Back to grammar class for me.
But... This may open a new avenue and the researcher's should be commended for attempting to find a way to preserve life.
Don't be. This really is a publicity stunt in some ways. ACT is to my mind a scam company in that what they do is addressed to investors and fund raising. Companies that never prodiuce anything in biotech and other tech fields can none the less be incredibly successful in making money.
I think they actually do science -- they hire people who do -- but I get the feeling they are one step above charlatanism. Maybe I am being harsh and unfair, but I am just goving my impression.
My guess is the breakthrough if it occurs will come through unexpectedly and will be effective enough to be obvious, won't involve embryonic stem cells and won't be done by one of the high profili huge money self promoting companies or labs -- which is why it will be "unexpected".
Nothing though is going to be as good as cliamed by the vested interest types.
EG chemotherapy helps and keeps people alive. But no one would say that's where we want to be in how we treat cancer.
The successful ethical results of adult stem cell research is making the judgements.
After twenty years of embryonic research there have been no cures, no treatments for diseases just hype and potentials and maybes.
Don't give up on a possible cure for your grandfather ... scientists are trying to get a drug into trials that acts like a cleansing agent in the brain, to dissolve through normal body functions the material which forms the brain gnarls. During a normal lifetime, your brain dissolves the material which forms tangles in Alzheimers, and something goes awry in Alzheimers that stops this normal dissolving process.
Give it up. Just join me in a chorus of "Every Sperm Is Sacred"
Care to elaborate, or was that a drive-by?
When an identical twin emerges from the initial zygote of conception, Science is not able to identify which of the first four to six to eight cells of the developing embryo is the actual one that is the zygote age of the twin. Does that help to see why this could actually be killing the twin in some instances? Or do you not consider the zygote age of the human lifetime to be worthy of protection as a human being in fact?
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