Op-Ed: Embryonic Stem Cells 2.0

May 1, 2008

When Shinya Yamanaka of Kyoto University reported his transformation of cultured mouse skin cells into a state approximating that of embryonic stem cells1, he was met with plenty of scepticism. Other scientists hadn’t anticipated that such a feat was possible. “Nobody else was even close to doing the same experiment,” says Richard Young of the Whitehead Institute in Cambridge, Massachusetts. “That was a very special breakthrough.” (Nature)