Shinya Yamanaka reprograms human a...(erative Medicine (CIRM). Their results o...)

Date:11/20/2007

erative Medicine (CIRM). Their results open the door to generating alternative sources of pluripotent cells from patients, which is a major step forward. However, much work still needs to be done to fully characterize and understand the capacity of these induced pluripotent cells to study and to treat human diseases.

While Yamanakas work would seem to eliminate the need for controversial research on human embryos, both he and Srivastava emphasized that research must continue. We are still a long way from finding cures or therapies from stem cells and we dont know what processes will be effective, Yamanaka said.

CIRMs Murphy added, Dr. Yamanakas work, which uses viral vectors to introduce into cells pluripotency-associated genes, further emphasizes the critical need we have to continue working with naturally occurring human embryonic stem cells, which remain the gold standard against which all alternative sources of human pluripotent stem cells must be tested.

According to Yamanaka, the next steps will be to understand how these cells can be differentiated into other types of cells and ultimately how they can be used to study disease models and as potential therapies. We are now finally in a position to make patient-specific stem cells for therapies without fear of immune-rejection and to make disease-specific stem cells that will reveal the underlying cause of many human diseases he said.

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Contact: Valerie Tucker vtucker@gladstone.ucsf.edu 415-734-2019 Gladstone Institutes Source:Eurekalert

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