Research and emerging treatments with stem cells today can be traced to a startling discovery 10 years ago when Shinya Yamanaka, MD, PhD, and his graduate student Kazutoshi Takahashi, PhD, reported a way to reprogram adult mouse cells and coax them back to their embryonic state – pluripotent stem cells.
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“Induced pluripotent stem cells have given us a window into human development unlike anything we had before,” [UCSF’s Eli and Edythe Broad Center director Arnold] Kriegstein said.
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As the science progresses on many fronts, Yamanaka has become concerned that the science has gotten far ahead of efforts to consider the ethics of some of the research.
“The speed of scientific progress is getting faster and faster, so if we discuss the ethical issues slowly…this is a big concern. I have been asking many bioethicists to think about these issues more aggressively. Some think it’s science fiction. But it’s not for the future. It’s for ourselves[,” Yamanaka says.]
At the same time, he is concerned too about public perception that the rate of progress may be slower than expected.
The GLP aggregated and excerpted this blog/article to reflect the diversity of news, opinion and analysis. Read full, original post: Induced pluripotent stem cells—10 years after the breakthrough
