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Article: The holy grail of medical science: to create the ultimate body- repair kit Parkinson's disease, hepatitis and damaged spinal cords could all be cured with injections of stem cells. Steve Connor explains
- Article from:
- The Independent (London, England)
- Article date:
- September 1, 2002
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright 2002 The Independent - London. Provided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
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Stem cells have been the holy grail of medicine for more than 20
years, but it was only in 1998 that their promise came closer to
reality. That was the year in which several teams of researchers
published the first studies showing that it was possible to extract
stem cells from early human embryos and grow them successfully in the
laboratory into a range of specialised tissues.
The idea behind stem cells is beautifully simple. If doctors had
access to cells with the potential to develop into any one of the 120
or so specialised tissues of the body, then injections of these cells
could be used to repair practically any damaged organ. Stem cells
could be used to repair an eye suffering from ...