A heart patient’s own skin cells soon could be used to repair damaged cardiac tissue thanks to pioneering stem cell research of the University of Houston’s newest biomedical scientist, Robert Schwartz.

His new technique for reprogramming human skin cells puts him at the forefront of a revolution in medicine that could one day lead to treatments for Alzheimer’s, diabetes, muscular dystrophy and many other diseases.

Schwartz brings his ground-breaking research to UH as the Cullen Distinguished Professor of Biology and Biochemistry and head of UH’s new Center for Gene Regulation and Molecular Therapeutics. He also is affiliated with the Texas Heart Institute at St. Luke’s Episcopal Hospital in the Texas Medical Center, where he is director of stem cell engineering.

“Professor Schwartz’s work will save lives, and his decision to pursue this pioneering research at UH is a big leap forward on our way to Tier-One status,” said John Bear, dean of the UH College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics. “Together with the many other outstanding scientists we’ve assembled here, Schwartz will help make this university a major player in medical research.”

Schwartz devised a method for turning ordinary human skin cells into heart cells. The cells developed are similar to embryonic stem cells and ultimately can be made into early-stage heart cells derived from a patient’s own skin. These then could be implanted and grown into fully developed beating heart cells, reversing the damage caused by previous heart attacks. These new cells would replace the damaged cardiac tissue that weakens the heart’s ability to pump, develops into scar tissue and causes arrhythmias. Early clinical trials using these reprogrammed cells on actual heart patients could begin within one or two years.

Although Schwartz is not the first scientist to turn adult cells into such stem cells, his improved method could pave the way for breakthroughs in other diseases. Schwartz’s method requires fewer steps and yields more stem cells. Armed with an effective way to make induced stem cells from a patient’s own skin, scientists can then begin the work of growing all kinds of human cells.

For example, new brain cells could treat Alzheimer’s patients or those with severe brain trauma, or a diabetic could get new insulin-producing cells in the pancreas. Generating new kidney, lung or liver tissue is also possible, with scientists even being able to one day grow an entirely new heart or other organ from these reprogrammed cells. Additionally, Schwartz and his team are working on turning induced stem cells into skeletal muscle cells to treat muscular dystrophy.

“We’re trying to advance science in ways folks never even dreamed about,” Schwartz said. “The idea of having your own bag of stem cells that you can carry through life and use for tissue regeneration is at the very cutting edge of science.”

This latest biomedical hire is a major step in the UH Health Initiative, an effort aimed at having the university become a world-class center for medical research. Creating new cross-disciplinary academic and health-related research opportunities for faculty and students is crucial to this initiative, as are collaborations with other Texas Medical Center member institutions. One of its top goals is to increase the amount of sponsored research expenditures awarded to UH, which is a key factor in attaining Tier-One status.

“Dr. Schwartz will expand UH’s expertise in promising new areas of scientific discovery to alleviate human disease. By recruiting premier scientists like Schwartz, UH is fast becoming a major player in the regional biomedical research community,” said Kathryn Peek, assistant vice president of University Health Initiatives at UH.

Most skin cancers are highly curable, but require surgery that can be painful and scarring.

A new study by Loyola University Health System researchers could lead to alternative treatments that would shrink skin cancer tumors with drugs. The drugs would work by turning on a gene that prevents skin cells from becoming cancerous, said senior author Mitchell Denning, Ph.D.

The study was published Jan. 15, 2010 in the Journal of Biological Chemistry.

More than 1 million people in the United States are diagnosed with skin cancer each year. In the new study, researchers examined a type of skin cancer, called squamous cell carcinoma, that accounts for between 200,000 and 300,000 new cases per year.

Squamous cell carcinoma begins in the upper part of the epidermis, the top layer of the skin. Most cases develop on areas that receive lots of sun, such as the face, ear, neck, lips and backs of hands. There are various surgical treatments, including simple excision, curettage and electrodessication (scraping with a surgical tool and treating with an electric needle) and cryosurgery (freezing with liquid nitrogen). Removing large skin cancers can require skin grafts and be disfiguring.

Sunlight can damage a skin cell’s DNA. Normally, a protein called protein kinase C (PKC) is activated in response to the damage. If the damage is too great to repair, the PKC protein directs the cell to die.

Healthy cells grow and divide in a cell-division cycle. At several checkpoints in this cycle, the cell stops to repair damaged DNA before progressing to the next step in the cycle. The new study found that the PKC gene is responsible for stopping the cell at the checkpoint just before the point when the cell divides. In squamous cell carcinoma, the PKC gene is turned off. The cell proceeds to divide without first stopping to repair its DNA, thus producing daughter tumor cells.

Denning said a class of drugs called protein kinase inhibitors potentially could shrink tumors by turning the PKC gene back on. Several such drugs have been approved by the Food and Drug Administration for other cancers. Denning is pursuing grant funding to test such drugs on animal models.

A molecular receptor pivotal to the action of male hormones such as testosterone also plays a crucial role in the body’s ability to heal, report scientists in the December issue of the Journal of Clinical Investigation.

In studies in mice, scientists at the University of Rochester Medical Center found that this receptor – the androgen receptor – delays wound healing. When scientists used an experimental compound to block the receptor, wounds healed much more quickly.

Scientists say that while the results in mice offer new insights into a potential new way to help the body heal faster, they stress that more research must be done before considering whether to explore the treatment in people whose wounds are slow to heal.

“This is a very interesting observation,” said Edward Messing, M.D., a urologist and surgeon at the University of Rochester Medical Center who was not involved in the study. “For people at the marginal end of health – the elderly, or people who have impaired healing for other reasons, such as diabetes – maybe blocking the androgen receptor in certain cells could speed up wound healing and help prevent infections.”

The work was led by Chawnshang Chang, Ph.D., director of the George Whipple Laboratory for Cancer Research and a widely recognized expert on the androgen receptor. The first author is former graduate student Jiann-Jyh Lai, Ph.D., who is now a researcher at the University of Massachusetts.

The work thrusts a sex hormone front and center into one of the most important and pervasive processes of the body. Inflammation is crucial for allowing the body to heal from wounds and to fight off invaders. But when our inflammatory response goes beyond what’s necessary, or if it occurs in the wrong time or place, it hurts our health and can be deadly.

By identifying the androgen receptor as a key player in at least one form of inflammation, the work opens a new window for scientists investigating differences between the genders when it comes to autoimmune or inflammatory diseases.

“Many inflammatory diseases, such as atherosclerosis and asthma, manifest themselves differently in the genders, indicating that sexual hormones could be involved. We’ve found that the androgen receptor plays a role regulating the inflammatory response in wound healing. It will be very interesting to see if the receptor plays a similar role in other diseases,” said Lai.

To block the receptor and speed healing, the team used ASC-J9, a synthetic chemical compound loosely based on a compound found in curry that can shut down the receptor selectively. ASC-J9 is being tested in Phase II trials as a treatment for severe acne by San Diego-based AndroScience Corp., a biotech company founded by Chang and colleagues. Both Chang and the University of Rochester own a stake in the company, which has licensed several of Chang’s research findings.

Chang’s current study delves in a detailed way into the molecular underpinnings of wound healing. When the body is injured, myriad cells rush to the scene, a bit like emergency responders hustling to a disaster. Some cells issue cries for help by sending out certain chemical messengers; other cells act as dispatchers to recruit more responders to the scene. It can seem like a great deal of chaos zeroed in on a small patch of skin. Usually, the body gets the job done, drawing upon dozens of molecular actors to heal the wound efficiently and quickly; sometimes, though, the inflammation can be detrimental.

For the current study funded by the National Cancer Institute, Chang and colleagues studied several different types of cells involved in wound healing. The team created different types of mice, turning off the androgen receptor in certain cell types while leaving it functional in other cells. Then scientists applied ASC-J9 to block the activity of the androgen receptor and studied the effects.

The team found that the androgen receptor spurs white blood cells known as macrophages to produce a chemical messenger called TNF-alpha, which in turn stimulates the body’s inflammatory response. The receptor also plays a role recruiting macrophages to the site of injury. When the team blocked the receptor, there were fewer macrophages and less TNF-alpha at the wound site, and the wound healed much more quickly.

“It is a surprise that the androgen receptor is involved in wound healing in so many ways,” said Chang, who is a faculty member in the departments of Pathology and Urology and the James P. Wilmot Cancer Center. “People have suspected that the receptor plays a role in wound healing, but it’s new that it plays a direct role guiding circulating macrophages to the area.”

Shutting off the interaction between the androgen receptor and androgen hormones like testosterone is a goal in several areas of medicine. The action is taken by doctors most commonly to treat patients with advanced prostate cancer. For some patients, doctors prescribe “chemical castration” and shut down the body’s supply of hormones like testosterone. This causes severe, systemic side effects that can include impotence, loss of libido, osteoporosis, and fatigue.

Scientists like Chang are exploring another way to prevent that same interaction, by shutting down the androgen receptor itself in select tissues but keeping the flow of hormones intact.

Messing, a surgeon who regularly treats men with prostate cancer, says that the ability to turn off the effects of androgens in just the tissues necessary is a challenge but holds great promise.

“Currently there is no way of preventing androgens in your body from reaching just one particular wound or one specific part of the body,” said Messing. “To stop them anywhere, you need to turn off androgens throughout the body, which has severe and unpleasant side effects, particularly in men. Turning off the androgen receptor only where you want to, and nowhere else, could lead to new treatments for diseases like prostate cancer and for speeding wound healing.”

Previous research has suggested that Celecoxib (Celebrex, Onsenal) can inhibit the development of squamous cell carcinoma in mice. This led researchers at Stanford’s School of Medicine to wonder if this non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAID)would have a similar effect on the most common skin cancer, basal cell carcinoma (BCC).

Jean Tang, MD, PhD and her colleagues dovetailed studies in mice with a randomized, double-blinded clinical trial in humans. The results of their study is published in the January 5 issue of the journal Cancer Prevention Research.

The researchers began with a mouse model to test whether Cox-2 was involved in basal cell carcinoma. The mice used had a genetic mutation similar to that of people with basal cell carcinoma (BCC). These mice develop numerous basal cell cancers after exposure to ionizing radiation. Tang and her colleagues found that deleting the Cox-2 gene in these mice reduced their overall tumor burden (a measure of the number and sizes of the skin tumors) by 70%. Conversely, the overall size of the tumors doubled in mice engineered to express higher than usual amounts of Cox-2.

To see if the same effect could be achieved in the mice pharmacologically, the researchers fed the mice with regular doses of celecoxib to inhibit Cox-2 which resulted in a reduction of their tumor burden by 35%.

In 2001, Tang and fellow researchers then enrolled 60 people with basal cell nevus syndrome (Gorlin Syndrome), a genetic predisposition to BCC, in a double-blinded, randomized, three-year clinical trial. About half the patients received 200 mg celecoxib twice a day in a pill format, while the others received a placebo. All patients were monitored at three-month intervals at one of four study sites for the development of new BCCs or the growth of previously identified cancers.

In 2003, when the study was under way, data began to emerge about unacceptably high risks of heart attack and stroke in patients taking a different NSAID, rofecoxib (marketed by Merck & Co. under the trade name Vioxx). Due to concerns about long-term treatment with Cox-2 inhibitors, the study was discontinued. No patient died or suffered adverse cardiovascular events due to their participation in the trial.

Although drug treatment had been discontinued, the researchers continued to monitor basal cell carcinoma formation in people who had received the drug or placebo for an additional year to complete the three-year study.

Both groups continued to develop new cancers during the study. However, in participants who entered the study with fewer than 15 BCCs, the oral celecoxib decreased the growth of skin tumors by about 50 percent as compared to placebo. Celecoxib treatment also reduced the overall tumor burden in this group of patients.

The drug did not significantly affect tumor number or burden in patients who entered the study with more than 15 skin lesions — perhaps due to an overall difference in disease severity.

Tang is continuing her focus on skin cancer prevention at Stanford, looking at whether it’s possible to develop a topical formulation of the drug that can be applied directly to the skin to achieve a similar protective effect without associated cardiovascular risk.

Celecoxib is a NSAID used to treat mild to moderate pain and help relieve symptoms of arthritis such as inflammation, swelling, stiffness, and joint pain. It is also used to treat acute pain and menstrual cramps. Celecoxib is used to help reduce the number of polyps in the intestine for patients with familial adenomatous polyposis (FAP). It has also been associated with an increased risk of heart attack and stroke in some people.

Basal cell nevus syndrome (Gorlin Syndrome) is a rare genetic condition. The gene linked to the syndrome is passed down through families as an autosomal dominant trait. The approximate prevalence is reported to be 1 case per 56,000-164,000 population. The prevalence is likely to be considerably higher in individuals younger than 20 years who present with basal cell carcinomas (BCCs). Persons with this syndrome often have problems that involve the skin, nervous system, eyes, endocrine glands, and bones.

Psoriasis, a chronic disease that causes red, raised patches of skin, is increasingly seen as a systemic disease with links to arthritis and cardiovascular disease. The December issue of Mayo Clinic Women’s HealthSource provides an overview of this sometimes embarrassing condition, what’s known about it and how it’s treated. Highlights of the overview include:

– Symptoms: Patches of thick, red skin covered with silvery, flaky scales commonly appear on the elbows and knees, but can appear anywhere on the body. They result from skin cells on overdrive, reproducing much faster than normal. Doctors aren’t sure why this overproduction occurs, although genetic and environmental factors likely play roles. Psoriasis symptoms come and go and flare in response to triggers that can include infections, some medications, alcohol, smoking, stress, sunburn, skin irritation or injury.

– A systemic illness: Doctors are finding that psoriasis is more than a skin disorder. About one in four people with psoriasis develop a form of arthritis called psoriatic arthritis that can cause pain, stiffness and swelling in the joints. Studies have shown that people with psoriasis face a higher risk of heart attack, stroke and other cardiovascular problems. The underlying link may be chronic inflammation, which plays a role in psoriasis and heart disease.

– Treatment: While psoriasis can’t be cured, a variety of topical and systemic treatment options can help control the condition. For mild-to-moderate psoriasis, topical treatments often are effective. Options include corticosteroids or retinoids to reduce inflammation; vitamin D analogs to slow skin growth; and tar, to reduce scaling, itching and inflammation. Calcineurin inhibitors (tacrolimus and pimecrolimus) can help reduce inflammation and skin cell buildup.

In addition, ultraviolet light slows the rapid growth of skin cells. Ultraviolet light therapy may be used alone or in combination with other treatments. Several systemic medications are used for severe forms of psoriasis, though these options pose the risk of serious side effects.

– Self-help measures: Home-care measures can help prevent or manage symptoms. A daily bath removes scales and calms inflamed skin. Adding bath oil, colloidal oatmeal, Epsom salts or Dead Sea salts can offer additional relief. After bathing, applying a thick moisturizing cream or ointment, such as petroleum jelly, can be helpful. During cold, dry weather, it’s beneficial to apply moisturizer several times a day. Short sessions in sunlight three or more times a week can improve psoriasis, as can avoiding known triggers.

Melanoma is the most serious type of skin cancer, claiming the lives of thousands of Americans each year. However, if it is recognized and treated in its early stages, it is nearly 100 percent curable. Since melanoma most often appears on fair-skinned men and women, public education has been geared primarily toward the Caucasian population. Researchers believe these efforts have resulted in early detection and increased survival rates among whites—from 68 percent in the 1970s to 92 percent in recent years. But, according to a recent study, other racial and ethnic groups have not seen similar improvements. In fact, “blacks in the U.S. have more advanced melanoma in association with worse survival rates,” suggesting that melanoma awareness programs should be expanded to better include minority communities, the study authors said.

For the study, researchers from the Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, led by Dr. Shasa Hu, assistant professor of dermatology and cutaneous surgery and Dr. Robert Kirsner, Steifel Laboratories Professor and vice chairman of the Department of Dermatology and Cutaneous Surgery, analyzed data from the Florida Cancer Data System, a state-wide, population-based registry of cancer incidence. From 1990 to 2004, more than 41,000 cases of melanoma were diagnosed—39,670 in white non-Hispanic individuals, 1,148 in white Hispanics and 254 in African-Americans. In the 14-year timeframe, incidence rates increased by at least 3 percent a year among white non-Hispanic men and women. White Hispanic women experienced a similar increase, but white Hispanic men saw less than 1.0 percent increase, and African-American men and women had virtually no increase.

However, while 12 percent of white non-Hispanic patients were diagnosed with melanoma that had spread to other parts of their bodies, 18 percent of white Hispanic patients and 26 percent of African-American patients had more advanced melanoma when they were diagnosed. Over the 15-year period, the proportion of advanced-stage disease diagnosed among all three groups decreased. White non-Hispanics saw a steady decrease, from 7.1 percent to 3.4 percent, but the proportion of Hispanics and African-Americans diagnosed at this stage decreased only slightly. Hu says melanoma among darker-skinned populations has not received as much attention, partly due to their overall lower risk compared with white non-Hispanics. She points out that their findings indicate that delayed melanoma diagnosis and the lowest survival rates are often seen in African-Americans.
In an accompanying editorial, Dr.’s Claudia Hernandez and Robin J. Mermelstein of the University of Illinois at Chicago said this study “adds melanoma to the list of documented health disparities in ethnic minority populations that includes asthma, cancer, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease among others.” These disparities can be influenced by biological, cultural, and environmental factors, such as genetic predisposition, socioeconomic status, and ultraviolet light exposure, but can also relate to healthcare system factors, such as difficulties in communication, access, and participation in research.

Hernandez and Mermelstein said that unless there is a major breakthrough in treatment for advanced melanoma, the primary opportunity for decreasing the death rate lies with increased surveillance. However, this must be accompanied by intervention, they stated. “An effective education and outreach model that transcends cultural and language barriers must be formulated,” they wrote. “It is important for physicians, researchers, and the general public to realize that disparities are not inevitable. All population groups deserve equal access, equal care, and equal opportunity to enjoy good health.”

Melanoma is one of the fastest growing cancers in the United States. Over the last decade, the incidence of melanoma has increased 2.4 percent each year. The National Cancer Institute estimates that 68,720 new cases will be diagnosed in 2009 and 8,640 people will die from it. Often, the first sign of melanoma is a change in the size, shape, color, or feel of an existing mole. Most melanomas have a black or blue-black area. Melanoma also may appear as a new mole that may be black, abnormal, or “ugly looking.” If you have a question or concern about something on your skin, don’t wait—see your health care provider.

As the classic saying goes, “You can never be too rich or too thin.” However, it seems American women would rather look younger than be rich or thin. A recent poll commissioned by ZO Skin Health and reveals that on average, women would be willing to spend more on a facial care system that would make them look 10 years younger than they would on a diet program that would make them lose 10 pounds.

The survey, which was conducted among 1,131 U.S. adult women by Harris Interactive, reported how much women care about the overall health and condition of their skin, particularly their face.

Even in a time when many women have cut back on discretionary spending, they are willing to spend on a facial care system that they believe will be effective at making their skin look younger and healthier.

“Results, results, results. At the end of the day, that’s all that matters. Women are fed up with products that don’t work, that make empty promises and bogus claims. What counts are the active ingredients and their concentrations,” says Dr. Zein Obagi, board-certified dermatologist and creator of ZO Skin Health.

Some of the products and services-like peels, injections, lasers, creams and machines–can be pricey, so overall spending has shifted away from procedures that are new and trendy, in favor of products that are proven effective.

The ZO Skin Health survey also revealed that women think about the health and condition of their skin more often than they think about their love life. About two in five women (43%) think about the health of their skin always or often, which is more often than they think about their relationship status (39%) or cardiovascular health (33%).

This is not surprising to skincare maverick Dr. Zein Obagi, who has been championing the importance of healthy skin throughout his 25-plus year career. Even in a recessionary economy, lipstick and cosmetics sell very well — presumably because women still like to look good, and they spend on affordable luxuries. “You can’t solve all of the world’s problems, but you can take care of yourself,” he said.

Best known for his original anti-aging skin care line available only through physicians, Dr. Obagi has now developed a skin care line that features products with high concentrations of active ingredients and time-released retinol, which has been proven to be the only topical skin care ingredient proven to reduce the signs of skin aging.

Smoking, being heavier, not using sunscreen and having had skin cancer appear to be associated with sun damage and aging of skin on the face, according to report based on a study of twins in the December issue of Archives of Dermatology, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.

Long-term exposure to the sun causes physical and structural changes to the skin, resulting in photodamage, according to background information in the article. Unlike typical skin aging, which is characterized by the development of fine wrinkles and skin growths, photodamage includes characteristics such as coarsely wrinkled skin, spots of extra pigment or lost pigment and dilated blood vessels on the face. Sun damage also has been associated with the development of cancerous growths. Up to 40 percent of aging-related changes are due to non-genetic factors.

To identify some of these environmental factors, Kathryn J. Martires, B.A., of Case Western Reserve School of Medicine, Cleveland, and colleagues studied 65 pairs of twins attending the 2002 annual Twin Days Festival in Twinsburg, Ohio. A total of 130 individuals completed surveys collecting information about skin type, history of skin cancer, smoking and drinking habits and weight. Clinicians assigned each participant a photodamage score, graded by such characteristics as wrinkling and change in pigmentation.

Photodamage scores were highly correlated among both monozygotic (identical) and dizygotic (fraternal) twins. Other factors associated with higher levels of photodamage included a history of skin cancer, heavier weight and smoking, whereas alcohol consumption was associated with lower photodamage scores.

“The Twins Days Festival provides a rare opportunity to study a large number of twin pairs to control for genetic susceptibility. Among the most important results is that a history of skin cancer and photodamage are highly associated in a population that shares genetic commonalities,” the authors conclude. “The relationships found between smoking, weight, sunscreen use, skin cancer and photodamage in these twin pairs may help to motivate the reduction of risky behaviors.”

Many heart transplant patients develop multiple skin cancers, with increased risk for some skin cancers among patients with other cancers and with increasing age, according to a report in the December issue of Archives of Dermatology, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.

“Solid organ transplant recipients are at increased risk for skin cancers,” the authors write as background information in the article. “Incidence, tumor burden and risk factors for skin cancer are well documented in renal transplant recipients. However, these characteristics are documented to a lesser extent in heart transplant patients, who are at least twice as likely to have skin cancer compared with renal transplant recipients.” Reasons for this could include the greater use of immunosuppressive medications and an older average age at the time of transplant.

Jerry D. Brewer, M.D., of Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minn., and colleagues reviewed the records of 312 patients who had received heart transplants between 1988 and 2006. Patients had an average age of 47.4 years at the time of their transplant and information was extracted from their charts regarding overall characteristics, cancers, risk factors and death.

The patients developed a total of 1,395 skin cancers; overall, 46.4 percent of the patients had developed skin cancer during the 19 years of follow-up. This included 1,236 squamous cell carcinomas and 151 basal cell carcinomas (the non-melanoma skin cancers), five malignant melanomas and three other types.

When evaluating the tumor burden of the 312 patients, 76 (24.4 percent) had at least one squamous cell carcinoma, 24 (7.7 percent) had only one squamous cell carcinoma and 19 (6.1 percent) had 10 or more; in addition, 54 (17.3 percent) had at least one basal cell carcinoma, 23 (7.4 percent) had only one and two (0.6 percent) had 10 or more.

Patients were more likely to develop squamous cell carcinoma if they had other types of cancer after their transplant, were older or had a known cause for their heart failure. Infection with the herpes simplex virus, being older and using a medication known as mycophenolate to suppress the immune system were associated with an increased risk of basal cell carcinoma.

“Although a considerable tumor burden was found in this study, the rate of death due to skin cancer was surprisingly low. Only one patient died of skin cancer, of a melanoma,” the authors write. “Health care providers and patients at our center have been educated for more than 10 years about the risk, early detection and treatment of skin cancer, which is apparent from the low mortality rate seen in the patients of this study.”

“Vigilant sun protection practices, skin cancer education, regular skin examinations and daily vitamin D supplementation are appropriate interventions in these high-risk heart transplant patients,” they conclude.

A groundbreaking discovery two years ago that turned ordinary skin cells back into an embryonic or “pluripotent” state was hailed as the solution to the controversial ethical question that has plagued stem-cell science for the past decade.

But is it the solution? Or have iPS cells (induced pluripotent stem cells) simply added a new dimension to the legal, social and ethical debates that are an important and necessary part of stem-cell advances.

This was the central question discussed by an international group of leading scientists, bioethicists and legal scholars who attended a workshop organized by the Stem Cell Network this summer in Barcelona. Outcomes of the workshop will be published Dec. 10 in the journal Cell. Among the issues summarized in the article are consent, privacy, clinical translation and intellectual property rights for iPS cells that are derived for scientific study and/or clinical therapies.

Timothy Caulfield, research director at the University of Alberta’s Health Law Institute and principal investigator at the Stem Cell Network, says that while iPS technology eliminates some of the ethical issues specific to embryonic stem-cell research it also adds new challenges.

“From a legal perspective, iPS technology is fascinating and complex. For example, if an iPS cell can be made into a functional human gamete, the potential exists for reproductive purposes. What would this mean for donor consent, concerns about cloning and rights of a potential child to know its parents,” said Caulfield.

“What could this mean to assisted reproduction practices and would-be parents with no other option? If anything, we know considerable thought and policy development needs to be placed around these and other issues.”

Michael Rudnicki, scientific director of the Stem Cell Network, agrees and says the promise of stem cell advances using iPS cells is staggering. “If iPS cells can be made safe for clinical therapies, it will ultimately make the delivery faster and more economical. But as a scientist I am cautious. So much is based on future prospects and there is much work that needs to be done in the labs before it becomes a therapeutic reality,” says Rudnicki.