Wow! Google Alerts finally sent me an article that discusses both the genetics of stem cells and my alma mater, The Johns Hopkins University. At the same time, the article feeds into my current discussion of the usability of adult vs. embryonic stem cells.
The notice I received connected to http://www.newswise.com/articles/view/514125/ and was summarized with the following clip:
An international team of researchers has discovered that human embryonic stem cell lines accumulate changes in their genetic material over time.
The researchers' work is described in the Sept. 4 online edition of Nature Genetics.
Anirban Maitra and Dan Arking, two of the authors and members of the McKusick-Nathans Institute of Genetic Medicine at Johns Hopkins state:
Embryonic stem cells are actually far more genetically stable than other stem cells, but our work shows that even they can accumulate potentially deleterious changes over time. Now it will be important to figure out why these changes occur, how they affect the cells' behavior and how time affects other human embryonic stem cell lines.
So, should we continue restricting funding of embryonic stem cell research to lines existing 4 years ago? Should all stem cell transplants be freshly-harvested adult stem cells? What happens with stem cell lines developed from stored umbilical cord cells? Hmmm, once again, more questions than answers.
Marie Godfrey, PhD