Human stem cell research

Stem cell research

Several years ago, some researchers discovered that a certain type of foetus’ cells could be used to replace sick or missing cells in an adult body, because they are able to evolve in another kind of cell, if they are treated the right way.

Stem cells: a definition

In an organism, there are always cells that are un-evolved. That means that they don’t have a special function, like muscle cells, liver cells or skin cells. These cells are called stem cells. This type of cells can become a cell with a certain specification.
There are two kinds of stem cells: embryonic and adult stem cells.
Embryonic stem cells only exist in the earlier phases of human life. When the conception is a week ago, you won’t be able to find this kind of stem cells, because they evolved in another type of cell by that time.
Adult stem cells can be found in embryos (a baby is called an embryo, when the conception is twelve weeks ago, when the bone cells appear) and in adult bodies. Some of the adult stem cells can evolve in other types of cells, other can’t.
It’s also a fact that adult stem cells only can evolve in certain types of other cells. In comparison, embryonic stem cells can evolve in all kind of cells.

How to get your stem cells

It’s not very difficult to get the embryonic stem cells that are needed for research or what else you want to do with it. As said before, you can get these cells out of a foetus in a very early phase of human life.
Nowadays, it’s a fact that a lot of foetuses of this kind are stored in laboratories. They are the leftovers of the so called IVF (in vitro fertilisation) method. (IVF is the making of an embryo in a test-tube. It is done for people who are, for instance, infertile.) In most IVF cases there are leftovers, because the lab assistants always fertilise more than one zygote (mostly 4 – 6), in case the foetus (that is placed in his mother after the fertilisation) doesn’t survive. In most IVF-cases, a couple of foetuses are not being used. They are frozen and stored, so that they can be used another time, if necessary.
All those frozen foetuses are in a very early phase of the human life (mostly 4-8 cell-phase), so they have the embryonic stem cells that can be used for the stem cell technology. The only thing you have to do is get the stem cells out of the foetus.
It’s a lot more difficult to get adult stem cells, because there is only a little number of them in the human body.

How to have your stem cells evolved

It’s not very hard to have your stem cells evolved. There are two ways:
The first way is to put the stem cells in a special kind of liquid. This liquid sends out a special kind of signal, that tell the cells to evolve.
The second way is to put the un-evolved cells in a human body. The cell is now surrounded by other cells with a certain function. Those ‘full-grown’ cells send a special kind of signal to the stem cells, just like the liquid I mentioned in the previous way, so the cells start to evolve. The cells get the same function as the surrounding cells.

What’s the use of stem cells

Of course it’s nice to know how you can get stem cells and it’s also nice to know that they can evolve in other types of cells, but how can it help us? The answer to that question is the following: scientists think that it is possible for us to cure illnesses, caused by old or broken cells with a special kind of stem cell technology.
Because stem cells can evolve in other kind of cells, it’s possible to replace sick or missing cells with them. Illnesses caused by this, like Parkinson disease or Alzheimer disease, are likely to be cured this way.

Opinions on stem cell research

Catholic church: First of all, the catholic church is against the IVF technology. Catholics think that having a baby is a gift of God, and such a thing can not be created in a laboratory.
They are also against freezing the left over foetuses in the labs, because each foetus is a real human life, and all human life has to be respected.

Scientist: scientist think that the results of stem cell research are a big break-through in the scienceworld, mostly because illnesses, that were thought never to be cured, are probably to be cured with these newly developed technologies. Surely, they want do search for more adaptions of human stem cells, because these cells may become very important for human life in the future, because the (western) world is suffering from obsolescence.

Singapore’s government: Signapore is the land were most of the stem cell research is done, because the stem cell evolve technology is developed over there.
In December 2000, they have accepted a new law on stem cell research. This law legalises the stem cell research.
They have also established a Stem Cell Advisegroup, that advises the government on ethical, social and legal aspects of the stem cell research.
By using these two things, Singapore wants to become the largest stem cell research nation. They think it’ll be very good for their economic increase.

The Dutch government: in the Netherlands, there are strict rules on research on human stem cells. The Dutch scientists who are studying this are only allowed to study problems that are related to conception. For other domains, researchers are only allowed to use international stem cells. It is forbidden to use foetuses or embryos for research.

My own opinion: I think stem cell research will be necessary. Not only the Netherlands, but the whole world is suffering from obsolescence. When we’re getting older, our cells will break down, and we’ll get diseases like those I’ve mentioned before, Parkinson disease and Alzheimer disease. If we want to cure those diseases, we certainly have to replace the cells that are broken. And how can we do that in an ‘easy’ way? Stem cell technology!
Maybe researches will find more and more applications for stem cell technology. It is certain a big break-through in the world of science and medical biology.
At one side, I can understand governments that try to ban research on stem cells, because you interfere in the human life when you use them as a medicine or something like that. On the other side, it’s probably the only way to save suffering people.