Saturday, March 22, 2014

New way to make muscle cells from human stem cells

Researchers from the University of Wisconsin-Madison have discovered a new way to make large concentrations of skeletal muscle cells from human stem cells. The stem cells being used can be turned into virtually any adult cell in the human body. Masatoshi Suzuki has directed the stem cell research for the university. The technique grows the stem cells in such a way that they turn into muscle cells. The importance of the new technique is that it does not require genetic modification as previous techniques did. This cells can be used for studying deseases such as ALS and muscular dystrophy.
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http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/03/140321164605.htm
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3 comments:

  1. UnknownMarch 23, 2014 at 5:52 PM

    Wow, really cool article! I know that stem cell advancement has been a large part of modern biology, and this is no exception. I think that it is great that we are developing new ways to help support hard to cure diseases and especially by regrowing muscle cells, muscular dystrophy might not even exist in the future. Something that also was interesting was the development of the technology for nanobots. Nanobots are tiny robots that can be programmed for a wide variety of functions, like repairing our body or fighting off viruses.

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  2. UnknownMarch 23, 2014 at 7:27 PM

    This is very interesting. My biggest question with anything revolving around the topic of stem cell modification would how it affects the debate of collecting human stem cells. As far as I understand, stem cells that 'can be turned into virtually any adult cell in the human body' are usually acquired from a human embryo. This either means the cell is taken from a volunteer female, or, more commonly, manufactured in a lab. I think the biggest discovery in terms of stem cell research will be when a way to produce stem cells that aren't scoured by debate is created. This will really open the door for more streamlined stem cell research

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  3. AnonymousMarch 25, 2014 at 4:07 PM

    The interesting thing to me is that this can not only cure disease, but enhance physical capability as a whole. And if we can create muscle cells, why not brain cells? Or nerve cells? We could not only eliminate physical aging but mental aging as well. The potential of stem cell research is seemingly endless, and could save and improve millions of lives.

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