Healthcare Technology Featured Article

December 21, 2011

UK Finds Success with First Embryonic Cells Able to be Used in Treatment of Illnesses


Though their use has been plagued by controversy in the U.S., British scientists have made the first human embryonic stem cells of a high enough grade to use in patients to speed treatments for heart disease, blindness and severe injuries like paralysis, where they can be used to regrow spinal cord tissue so patients might walk again, according to a story by Kate Kelland at Reuters as reported at Yahoo News.

These cells, grown by a team from King’s College of London, have been deposited in a public stem cell bank, the UK Stem Cell Bank (UKSCB), for development in human trials by drug companies and researchers by 2014, according to Kelland’s story. The UKSCB will test and validate them before offering them to researchers, she adds.

"This first batch of cells is the culmination of nearly 10 years of research. This is a significant milestone," Peter Braude, who led the King's team, told Kelland.

Here’s where the controversy in the U.S. comes in. Braude's team's cells were grown from frozen embryos donated by patients who had had in-vitro fertilization treatment and no longer wanted to use their remaining stored embryos. The embryos would otherwise have been discarded, Braude told Kelland.

But using these embryos, which some see as “living beings,” has fueled controversy in the U.S., with many protesting that using them destroys life and others denouncing the human race’s right to create it.  So they have urged researchers to use other materials to create stem cells but Kelland reports that the embryonic cells used in the study are “the first to be grown completely free from animal-derived products, known as ‘xeno-free.’

Using xeno-free embryos is so critical because using “feeder layers” from, for example, mice, instead, limits the work scientists can do in using stem cells to find treatments. hES (or xeno-free) cells can only be harvested from embryos

The really exciting part of the announcement comes from the possibilities it opens up for use in regenerative medicine trials in patients, Kelland writes. Braude told reporters at a briefing that the cells “have the potential to become the ‘gold standard’ lines for developing new stem cell based therapies,” according to the story.

But it may take years for this all to come to fruition, Kelland writes. However, the cells could be used in human trials of potential therapies by 2014, the team said, she reports.

"In the future, patients hoping for the benefit of regenerative medicine for serious medical conditions caused by illness, injury and aging can expect improved progress on cures or amelioration from hES cell-based therapy," Dusko Ilic, a senior lecturer in stem cell science at King's, told Kelland.

The bank hopes to make available a panel of tested clinical grade lines within the next three years, Glyn Stacey, head of the UKSCB, told Kelland.

"The process of testing will be rigorous and not all cells lines received will make the grade," he informed her.


Deborah DiSesa Hirsch is an award-winning health and technology writer who has worked for newspapers, magazines and IBM in her 20-year career. To read more of her articles, please visit her columnist page.

Edited by Juliana Kenny
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