January 8, 2007 08:10 AM
ABC World News (1/7, story 9, 0:35, Harris) reported, "Scientists announced an important advance in stem cell research that could change the face of an emotionally charged debate. Researchers at Harvard and Wake Forest reported today their lab tests showed that amniotic fluid from pregnant women contains stem cells with tremendous medical potential. These cells can be gathered without hurting the mother or the fetus, and would prove much less controversial than research done with embryos."
NBC Nightly News (1/7, story 5, 3:00, Seigenthaler) reported, "A discovery of a new source of stem cells." NBC (Synderman) added that physicians "caution that being able to grow these cells into tissue today does not mean patients can be treated tomorrow." Synderman continued, "The goal is to create a national bank of stem cells."
USA Today (1/8, 7D, Weise) reports that the study, published in Sunday's edition of the journal Nature Biotechnology, found that "amniotic stem cells grew readily into independent cell lines, or colonies, doubling in just 36 hours." Researchers "were able to get the amniotic cells to differentiate into fat, bone, muscle, blood, nerve and liver cells," and the amniotic stem cells, "unlike embryonic stem cells, don't form tumors when implanted into mice." Still, "much research into the safety and effectiveness of these potential embryonic stem cell substitutes still needs to be done." However, their "huge advantage" is "that they can be easily harvested from both amniotic fluid as well as placental tissue after a baby is born." Also, "because amniotic fluid is so easy to harvest, it would make it possible to create thousands of cell lines." The Dallas Morning News /AP (1/8) writes, "scientists noted they still don't know exactly how many different cell types can be made from the stem cells found in amniotic fluid. They also said that even preliminary tests in patients are years away."
In a front page story, the Los Angeles Times (1/8, A1, Kaplan) notes, "Dr. Dario Fauza, coordinator of the surgical research laboratories at Children's Hospital Boston, has used the cells to grow tissue to repair defective diaphragms and tracheas in sheep. He has asked the Food and Drug Administration for permission to do the same for children born with herniated diaphragms. It would be the first human clinical trial involving amniotic stem cells, he said." However, "Larry Goldstein, a professor of cellular and molecular medicine at UC-San Diego who studies embryonic stem cells, said the absence of tumors might signal a limitation of amniotic stem cells."
HealthDay (1/8, Gardner) quotes Dr. Darwin Prockop, director of the Center for Gene Therapy at Tulane University Health Sciences Center in New Orleans, as saying, "It's a very nice paper, very good science." He added, "But I can't quite put a circle around the potential of the cells."
In a front page article, the Washington Post (1/8, A1, Weiss) adds that study leader Anthony Atala, director of the Institute for Regenerative Medicine at Wake Forest University School of Medicine in Winston-Salem, N.C., "and other scientists emphasized that they don't believe the cells will make embryonic stem cells irrelevant," and "George Daley, a Harvard stem cell researcher, echoed that sentiment," asserting, "[t]hey are not a replacement for embryonic stem cells." Plureon Corp. of Winston-Salem, a privately held company on whose board of directors Atala sits, has licensed "certain patent claims relating to the cells." Also, "some questioned the novelty of the newly described cells. Similar cells have been under study for years with little fanfare."
