Bone Marrow Stem Cell Science Continues to Advance

Have you noticed how bitter some advocates for ESCR seem to be about the ongoing and ubiquitous advances in adult stem cell research? Well, here’s another story to raise their dander: Catherine Verfaillie, who first demonstrated that a certain type of bone marrow stem cell is multi-potent and perhaps even, pluripotent—and was roundly criticized for it—continues to demonstrate that her science is good. This time in pigs.

She will of course continue to state that ESCR should be done, too. And of course, no one is trying to stop it from being done. The issues are the extent and rules of federal funding and whether to permit human cloning. Besides, any scientist who casts doubt on the ethics of ESCR/Cloning faces being branded “anti-science” and treated accordingly by colleagues. You might lose your lab and be forced to teach “punishment” freshman classes—as happened to Dr. David Prentice at Indiana State University—or conveniently be denied tenure, as happened at MIT to Dr. James Sherley.