Life Science

This is a News and Views story that discusses the recent discovery of a chemical that allows mouse embryonic stem cells to self-renew. If this could work in human ES cells it is a major breakthrough for stem cell therapy applications, as it gets rid of complications created by animal feeder layers.

This is a really cool paper from Bert Vogelstein's lab about using bacteria to fight cancer. They have been publishing papers for the last few years using the anaerobic bacterium clostridium novyi-NT as an alternative cancer treatment. If you haven't heard about this check out this most recent paper and read some of the older papers they cite. I really love this line of thought for cancer treatment because it is a lot more out-of-the-box than other people in the cancer field are thinking right now.

This website has many of the general information on stem cells. It is a good start for people who are just learning about stem cells and people who have a general interest in stem cells.

This article describes parents using preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD), often done in conjunction with in vitro fertilization, to choose embryos that will have a genetic "defect" similar to their own, such as deafness or dwarfism. The article raises some interesting points about the ethics of PGD and hits on points I've never even thought of before. People were freaked out when people were chosing good traits on purpose, now what will they think when they are choosing defects on purpose.

A new report about synthetic biology recommends that scientist police themselves to keep the world safe from designer pathogens, etc.
Is this a good idea? It worked with recombinant DNA.