Why Are We Celebrating the Reprogramming of Adult Cells?

Theresa A. Deisher, Ave Maria Biotechnology Company, Research and Development Director, writes:

The recent publications about the ability to reprogram adult skin cells to become virtually identical to embryonic stem cells has been hailed by pro-life groups as a ‘Moral Victory’. Initially, I believed the work to be ‘Moral’, while at the same time I found the term ‘Victory’ perplexing.

I stated publicly on ‘Conversations with Fr. Bob’, a Seattle, WA talk radio show taped December 3, 2007, that I saw “no moral issues with the technique” of adult cell reprogramming. Unfortunately, I learned later that the published works cannot be considered ‘Moral’. The ability to transform adult cells into embryonic stem cells could be moral, however, a close inspection of the two published papers revealed that cells from an electively aborted fetus were used in the work, and therefore it cannot be considered moral.

In order to transform adult cells into embryonic cells, the researchers introduced four genes essential for ‘embryonic stem cell character’ into the adult cells. First, the researchers had to make the genes and virus materials needed to transform the adult cells. Both researchers used versions of the HEK 293 cell to do this. This is a cell, the Human Embryonic Kidney 293 cell, used commonly in biomedical research for DNA (gene) and virus production. I was informed quite recently that the 293 cells were produced from an electively aborted fetus. I was able to verify that easily. The term embryonic in the name is misleading....

HT to Darla for the link!