Cloning Breakthrough Detailed On Life Extension Web Site.Business Editors and Health/Medical Writers FORT LAUDERDALE Fort Lauderdale (lô`dərdāl), residential, commercial, and resort city (1990 pop. 149,377), seat of Broward co., SE Fla., on the Atlantic coast; settled around a fort built (c.1837) in the Seminole War, inc. 1911. , Fla.--(BW HealthWire)--April 28, 2000 The Life Extension Foundation has just posted an exclusive interview on its comprehensive web site for health-related information (http://www.lef.org ). The interview, with Dr. Michael West Michael West may refer to:
wipe out destroy, destruct - do away with, cause the destruction or undoing of; "The fire destroyed the house" 2. today's problems of organ rejection, limited organ and tissue supply, and gene therapy, paving the way for cures to such diseases as Parkinson's disease Parkinson's disease or Parkinsonism, degenerative brain disorder first described by the English surgeon James Parkinson in 1817. When there is no known cause, the disease usually appears after age 40 and is referred to as Parkinson's disease. , diabetes, sickle cell anemia sickle cell anemia n. A chronic, usually fatal inherited form of anemia marked by crescent-shaped red blood cells, occurring almost exclusively in Blacks, and characterized by fever, leg ulcers, jaundice, and episodic pain in the joints. , muscular dystrophy muscular dystrophy (dĭs`trōfē), any of several inherited diseases characterized by progressive wasting of the skeletal muscles. There are five main forms of the disease. , organ failure, and perhaps aging itself. The breakthrough involves the ability to grow biologically super-young cells of any kind desired from skin cells that are so old as to be on the brink of death. This is projected to allow even very old individuals to donate a skin cell or a cell scraped from the inside of the cheek, and to have a single such aged cell give rise to super-youthful replacement cells, tissues, and organs. Certain of these cells could be injected into the older donor, and would distribute themselves throughout the body, seeking out physiological weakness and correcting it by replacing dead or defective cells with new, youthful ones that are immune from rejection. The work, being published in tomorrow's issue of Science, is the latest and perhaps the most sweeping breakthrough in cloning and embryonic stem cell Embryonic stem cells (ES cells) are stem cells derived from the inner cell mass of an early stage embryo known as a blastocyst. Human embryos reach the blastocyst stage 4-5 days post fertilization, at which time they consist of 50-150 cells. ES cells are pluripotent. research, a field so promising that it was endorsed by 67 Nobel Laureates Winners of the Nobel Prize are scientists, writers and peacemakers who have been awarded in their field of endeavour, and who are known collectively as either Nobel laureates or Nobel Prize winners. and several other prominent scientists in a letter published in Science last year, urging Congress not to block developments in this field over misconceptions involving xeroxing humans for spare parts Spare parts, also referred to as Service Parts is a term used to indicate extra parts available and in proximity to the mechanical item, such as a automobile, boat, engine, for which they might be used. Spare parts are also called “spares. , the science fiction version of how cloning would be used. As Dr. West explains in his interview on the Life Extension Foundation web site today at http://www.lef.org/featured-articles/apr2000_clon_01.html , he doesn't envision growing new human beings to scavenge scav·enge v. scav·enged, scav·eng·ing, scav·eng·es v.tr. 1. To search through for salvageable material: scavenged the garbage cans for food scraps. 2. for body parts. Instead, the process involves growing embryonic cells only to a point at which they acquire total power to become any other kind of cell or tissue, and never allowing them to move on to form any individuality. Essentially a cellular dot smaller than the period at the end of this sentence would be used to grow mature tissue replacements directly in a laboratory. The new research published in Science, according to Dr. West, rewinds the cellular aging clock "in the same way that a key can be used to wind an old antique clock." The new work therefore corrects the major defect of the cloning method used to create Dolly the cloned sheep, the first mammal cloned from adult cells. Unfortunately for Dolly, in inheriting the genes from her predecessor, she also inherited the biological age of her predecessor. The six new cloned cows made in ACT's labs, however, are actually biologically younger than ordinary cows of the same age, even though they were created from cells that were at death's door. The Life Extension Foundation's interview with Dr. West is the most thorough examination of this breakthrough and its implications for medicine now available. The Foundation's web site - http://www.lef.org - is the world's best and most extensive source of comprehensive information about how to stay healthy and young as long as possible. Its new 945-page book, "Disease Prevention and Treatment Protocols, features advanced therapies to prevent and treat age-related diseases. Information on the book is available at http://www.lef.org/books-media/dispreprot.html The protocols in this book are available free of charge on the Foundation's web site at http://www.lef.org/protocols/ For more information, contact Mike Freedman at 954-561-7933, extension 10 or email mike@lef.org Dr. West can be reached directly at ACT at 508-756-1212. For a general source of information about ACT, call Renee Connolly at 212-696-4455, extension 227. |
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