Stem cells; from the beginning – yes? (Part 1)

Transplants have been and still are a huge step forward in the improving the lives of people via surgery, but that’s only just the surface of it. The future now seems to be growing body parts and organs that are tailor made for the patient. This in turn would decrease the risk of rejection plus the patients would not have to take immunosuppressants for the rest of their lives, which inevitably weakens their immune system.

Bearing in mind that a lot of time, effort and money is required for further research, it seems that stem cells are a promising way forward, allowing the regeneration of the patient’s own bone and tissue either within their own bodies or within a lab environment and the transplanted.

An exciting new field it may be, however along with its’ vast treatment potential, stem cells also seem to bring about a lot of controversy; politicians, government, the public, even scientists themselves. Furthermore the media have this amazing ability to take something completely out of context and misrepresent it to the general public making the topic seem either very confusing or poorly/wrongly understood.

In one of my previous posts (on curing baldness) a lot of people seemed confused by the topic of stem cells and I ended up emailing them to explain certain details/concepts further (not that I am an expert in any way but I just have a general interest in the area).

I wanted to write a new blog post on some upcoming research but realised that it probably won’t make much sense unless I explain the basics first. My problem is I’m not sure where to start. If I was teaching a tutorial, basics principles for scientists would lead to talks on cell ultra structure and culturing methods etc. I’m pretty sure that’s NOT what we’re aiming for here. Well not yet anyway. It reminds me of what a professor once said to me – ‘Simplicity is key. Enquiring minds will follow, just believe in yourself’. Imagine a yoda-esque glow around him if you will :P

So this is my attempt at explaining the basics... :)