Click here to read Stem Cells 101, an overview of stem cell research

The two scientists behind the lawsuit that has temporarily blocked federal funding for embryonic stem-cell research said Wednesday they were motivated by ethical objections to destroying human embryos for medical research. (Wall Street Journal)

As counsel for the researcher plaintiffs in the lawsuit against the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) on experiments using human embryonic stem cells, I write to correct your assertion that the progress of the suit poses a threat to “the very framework of federal funding for science” [Premium (Nature)]

The Obama administration asked a federal judge Tuesday to allow the government to continue funding embryonic stem-cell research while a case challenging the program makes its way through the courts. (Wall Street Journal)

When the geneticist Francis Collins was named director of the National Institutes of Health, last summer, he became the public face of American science and the keeper of the world’s deepest biomedical-research-funding purse. He was praised by President Obama and waved through the Senate confirmation process without objection. There also came a peer review of a sort that he’d never experienced, conducted in the press and in Internet science forums. Collins read in the Times that many of his colleagues in the scientific community believed that he suffered from “dementia.” Steven Pinker, a cognitive psychologist at Harvard, questioned the appointment on the ground that Collins was “an advocate of profoundly anti-scientific beliefs.” P. Z. Myers, a biologist at the University of Minnesota at Morris, complained, “I don’t want American science to be represented by a clown.” (The New Yorker)

Scientists are poised to inject cells created from embryonic stem cells into some patients with a progressive form of blindness and others with devastating spinal cord injuries. That’s a welcome step for researchers eager to move from the laboratory to the clinic and for patients hoping for cures. But beyond being loathsome to those with moral objections to any research using cells from human embryos, the tests are worrying many proponents: Some argue that the experiments are premature, others question whether they are ethical, and many fear that the trials risk disaster for the field if anything goes awry. (Washington Post)

The Journal of Law, Medicine and Ethics (Volume 38, Issue 2, Summer 2010) is now available by subscription only.

“Embryo Stem Cell Research:  Ten Years of Controversy” by John A. Robertson, 191-203.

The Journal of World Intellectual Property (Volume 13, Issue 4, July 2010) is now available by subscription only.

Relevant articles include:

• “Patent Policy for Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research in Taiwan” by Jerry I.-H. Hsiao, 540-555.

Stem cell research supporters in Congress are hoping to take quick action to reverse the research ban imposed by U.S. District Court Judge Royce Lamberth on Monday. They expect to take up the issue when Congress returns from recess on 13 September. The question is how: by passing a new law, or by modifying Dickey-Wicker, a 14-year-old law banning federal research that destroys embryos. Either way, with House of Representatives and Senate Democratic leadership so far silent on the issue, it’s unclear how far their efforts will get less than 2 months before elections in November. (ScienceInsider)

Newspapers across the country published editorials reacting to U.S. District Court Judge Royce Lamberth’s recent ruling challenging the legality of the Obama administration’s guidelines allowing federal funding for embryonic stem cell research. Summaries of the editorials appear below. (Medical News Today)

Congress may take up the issue of embryonic stem cell research when it reconvenes next month. Rep. Diana DeGette (D-Colorado) says there is a “new urgency” to pass legislation after a federal judge’s ruling on Monday essentially halted the research. (9NEWS.com)

Monday’s decision from the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia halting all federal funding of embryonic stem-cell research is a surprising milestone in the decade-long debate over this morally fraught field — and another opportunity to make the case that medical research must proceed hand-in-hand with respect for life and human dignity. (National Review Online)

How should clinics that treat patients with injections of their own stem cells be regulated? That question is about to test the jurisdiction of the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in a landmark legal battle — and is fuelling a war of words between doctors marketing such therapies and academics who urge caution. (Nature News)

A U.S. district judge granted a preliminary injunction Monday to stop federal funding of embryonic stem cell research that he said destroys embryos, ruling it went against the will of Congress. (CNN)

Biomedical Microdevices (Volume 12, Number 4, 2010) is now available by subscription only.

Articles Include:

• “What We Know and Don’t Know About the Bioeffects of Nanoparticles: Developing Experimental Approaches for Safety Assessment” by Mel E. Stratmeyer, Peter L. Goering, Victoria M. Hitchins and Thomas H. Umbreit, 569-573.
• “Nanotechnology for Regenerative Medicine” by Dongwoo Khang, Joseph Carpenter, Young Wook Chun, Rajesh Pareta and Thomas J. Webster, 589-596.
• “Combinatorial Targeting and Nanotechnology Applications” by Glauco R. Souza, Fernanda I. Staquicini, Dawn R. Christianson, Michael G. Ozawa and J. Houston Miller, et al., 597-606.
• “Compressed Collagen Gel as the Scaffold for Skin Engineering” by Kuikui Hu, Hui Shi, Ji Zhu, Dan Deng and Guangdong Zhou, et al., 627-635.
• “Sustained Release of Insulin Through Skin by Intradermal Microdelivery System” by Yan Wu, Yunhua Gao, Guangjiong Qin, Suohui Zhang and Yuqin Qiu, et al., 665-671.
• “Fabrication of Three-Dimensional Scaffolds for Heterogeneous Tissue Engineering” by Li-Hsin Han, Shalu Suri, Christine E. Schmidt and Shaochen Chen, 721-725.

NEJM (Volume 363, Number 2, July 8, 2010) is now available by subscription only.

Articles Include:

• “The SGR for Physician Payment - An Indispensable Abomination” by H.J. Aaron.
• “Implementing Health Care Reform - Why Medicare Matters” by R.A. Berenson, 101-103.
• “The Independent Payment Advisory Board” by T.S. Jost, 103-105.
• “Identifying and Eliminating the Roadblocks to Comparative-Effectiveness Research” by D.F. Martin, M.G. Maguire, and S.L. Fine, 105-107.
• “Limbal Stem-Cell Therapy and Long-Term Corneal Regeneration” by P. Rama and Others, 147-155.
• “Genomic Medicine: Genomewide Association Studies and Assessment of the Risk of Disease” by T.A. Manollo, 166-176.
• “Toward More Uniform Conflict Disclosures - The Updated ICMJE Conflict of Interest Reporting Form” by J.M. Drazen and Others, 188-189.
• “Individual Genomes on the Horizon” by D. Watkins and C. Gallant, 195-196.

A lot of interest has been generated by the possibility of deriving gametes from embryonic stem cells and bone marrow stem cells. These stem cell derived gametes may become useful for research and for the treatment of infertility. In this article we consider prospectively the ethical issues that will arise if stem cell derived gametes are used in the clinic, making a distinction between concerns that only apply to embryonic stem cell derived gametes and concerns that are also relevant for gametes derived from adult stem cells. [Premium (Health Care Analysis)]

When scientists play politics with science, society and science both suffer, sometimes with life-threatening implications. One recent example is Climategate, with revelations that leading global warming researchers played with the data, concealed and tried to suppress data that challenged their assertions, and attempted to game the peer review system. And as a result of scientists caught playing politics with science, claims of man-made global warming have been met with growing skepticism. (American Thinker)

Utilizing TCA Cellular’s proprietary therapy, a couple of thousand adult stem cells have been extracted from the patient’s own bone marrow, Mesenchymal Stem Cells have been separated, purified, multiplied to millions and will be infused into Cole’s spinal cord later this month. (Businesswire)

Last week the Food and Drug Administration gave its first approval for a clinical trial of an embryonic stem cell treatment. Embryonic stem cells are special because they can grow, or differentiate, into any kind of human tissue. Many believe they hold great promise for treating a wide range of diseases and disorders, from Alzheimer’s to cancer to spinal cord injuries to blindness. (Science Progress)

Doctors have carried out pioneering lifesaving surgery to give a new windpipe to a British teenager suffering from cancer. The 19-year-old was able to speak within a few days of the operation carried out in Italy using her own stem cells. (Daily Mail)

NEJM (Volume 363, Number 4, July 22, 2010) is now available by subscription only.

Articles Include:

• “Efficacy of Gene Therapy for X-Linked Severe Combined Immunodeficiency” by Salima Hacein-Bey-Albina and Others
• “Patient-Specific Induced Pluripotent Stem-Cell Models for Long QT Syndrome” by A. Moretti and Others