Major roadblock possibly cleared for stem cell research

Researchers at the University of California, San Francisco have found rare stem cells extracted from cells in lactating breast tissue and breast milk that are capable of becoming most of the different cell types. This is an amazing research breakthrough as it was previously thought that there were no pluripotent cells in the body after the embryonic stage of human development. When these cells were put into mice or in cell culture, the cells differentiated to produce multiple cell types, including those for the heart, intestine, brain, pancreas, even cartilage.

These stem cells have the potential to generate new tissues and could essentially be a “patch kit”, healing wounds and reconstructing damaged or missing organs. They could also be used as a resource to study how cells become pluripotent, leading to more research and potentially better and more accessible “patch kits”. This discovery has also led scientists to hypothesize that pluripotent cells are actually scattered throughout the bodies of men and women in other organs.

However, some scientists are not fully convinced that these cells are truly pluripotent because they fail one widely accepted test for embryonic cells: when injected into mice, they don't form a type of tumor called the teratoma. For many, this failure is a deal-breaker.

Nevertheless, if the research can continue on, and if breast stem cells are found to be truly pluripotent, this could potentially solve the key issue that surrounds the medical use of stem cells. Historically, the ethical quandary rose with the destruction of human embryos for stem cell derivation. On the grounds that the human embryo is a human life with moral value justifying its protection, the extraction of embryonic stem cells is unethical.  The use of adult stem cells and umbilical cord blood stem cells has generally been considered to be free of any particular ethical issues.  In fact they have been applauded as ethically superior alternatives to the use of embryonic stem cells. If we can add breast milk stem cells to this list, the road to stem cell research and improved medicine will be cleared of a major obstacle.

http://www.bioethics.org.au/Resources/Resource%20Topics/Stem%20Cells.html

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21729084.800-are-breast-milk-stem-cells-the-real-deal-for-medicine.html

http://www.bioedge.org/index.php/bioethics/bioethics_article/10436