Embryo cloning for UK research

AngryBadger

Noted a brief piece about this on Sky News last week. The basic thrust of using embryos in clinical research is the exploitation of supposed stem cell plasticity.

Now this cloning embryos idea is way too close to the idea of cloning whole people for harvesting organs, or similar goals, for my liking. My query here is two-fold, does anyone else thinkg this is morally wrong? Also given that there is ample evidence of stem cell populations in adults is there really an impetus for this kind of work?

Personally I don't understand the need to clone people, it makes no sense since it's basically solicited murder, whatever way you cut it, in addition to which, even if we could bring ourselves to accept this practice, the fact that a relevant portion of your genetic material, eg. mitochondrial, is passed down the maternal line would surely mean that organs produced in this way would be unusable unless the surrogate mothers involved were a perfect genetic match for the tissue donor's actual mother.

Just so we're clear, I'm not limiting this to the question of whether an embryo should be counted as a sentient being or not.....

GuanYin

AngryBadger wrote:

Noted a brief piece about this on Sky News last week. The basic thrust of using embryos in clinical research is the exploitation of supposed stem cell plasticity.

Now this cloning embryos idea is way too close to the idea of cloning whole people for harvesting organs, or similar goals, for my liking. My query here is two-fold, does anyone else thinkg this is morally wrong? Also given that there is ample evidence of stem cell populations in adults is there really an impetus for this kind of work?

Personally I don't understand the need to clone people, it makes no sense since it's basically solicited murder, whatever way you cut it, in addition to which, even if we could bring ourselves to accept this practice, the fact that a relevant portion of your genetic material, eg. mitochondrial, is passed down the maternal line would surely mean that organs produced in this way would be unusable unless the surrogate mothers involved were a perfect genetic match for the tissue donor's actual mother.

Just so we're clear, I'm not limiting this to the question of whether an embryo should be counted as a sentient being or not.....

Firstly, I don't think you understand the process involved in such research because its very very highly regulated, nowadays you need licences just to buy the equipment involved.

The main point here is that noone is trying to clone people. All they have been approved for is the process of producing embryos for harvesting stem cells. Even if they tried to let the embryo's develop, we don't yet have the technology in place to allow it to develop in vitro and alarm bells would start ringing worlwide if you tried to do it the same manner as Dolly-like clones were produced. (I don't care what the Raleans say, do you honestly believe a bunch of people who think that the Aliens speak to them?)

Stem cells are produced by humans through out their life cycle in bone marrow. This is how we renew our blood cells. However, there has been no success in differentiating marrow stem cells into other types of viable cells for medical research. Furthermore, even if someone managed it tomorrow, because if the difference in source, all current safeguard tests and research would have to be repeated, putting stem cell research back significantly.

As such, embryo/foetus sources are the only viable alternative. However, there is some very understandable ethical and moral concerns about harvesting stem cells from naturally occuring foetuses in abortions or miscarriages. The alternative is in vitro production.

To be fair, its alot less like cloning than the very poorly written media reports would have you believe and the safeguards are stringent. Its much like the IVF procedures (but not quite) commonly used around the world.

And as far as harvesting organs, the ultimate goal of stem cell research is to grow the individual organs from stem cells. So there is no need to harvesting anything from anyone or anything, except perhaps, a petri dish.

AngryBadger

syke wrote:

Firstly, I don't think you understand the process involved in such research because its very very highly regulated, nowadays you need licences just to buy the equipment involved.

(I don't care what the Raleans say, do you honestly believe a bunch of people who think that the Aliens speak to them?)

Stem cells are produced by humans through out their life cycle in bone marrow. This is how we renew our blood cells. However, there has been no success in differentiating marrow stem cells into other types of viable cells for medical research. Furthermore, even if someone managed it tomorrow, because if the difference in source, all current safeguard tests and research would have to be repeated, putting stem cell research back significantly.

As such, embryo/foetus sources are the only viable alternative.

And as far as harvesting organs, the ultimate goal of stem cell research is to grow the individual organs from stem cells. So there is no need to harvesting anything from anyone or anything, except perhaps, a petri dish.

I'm familiar with both the regs, and principles involved here. My point,which I'll grant is venturing into the philosophical, is that authorizing the use of cloned embryos is a step closer to cloning humans,and I don't see the benefit of this line of research being brought to its' conclusion.

Raleans didn't enter my mind during this post, but let's be realistic, the process used to create Dolly is not a particularly elegant one, and it is very much transferrable to the human species. The only reason this hasn't already occured is, as you correctly observe, the ethical objections that would result from the public at large.

Again though, what I'm querying here is why we're authorizing cloning embryos at all, and isn't it a step closer to the real deal of cloning adult humans?

To clarify the current state of stem cell research. Yes, the ideal is to generate in vitro complete, functional human organs from the patients own material. But right now all research has reliably shown is that stem cells exhibit a high degree of plasticity. Scores of papers have presented work showing the development of multiple classes of tissues from cultures of stem cells. However, we're nowhere near the level of knowledge, and control necessary to generate whole organs.

Moreover, as many papers as are based on embryonic stem cells, an equal number have been based on using populations of adult stem cells, and these cells have shown a comparable degree of plasticity to embryonic stem cells. And for the record, the bone marrow is not the only area known to possess stem cells in adults. Offhand, I know I've read several papers reviewing stem cells cutures taken from the liver, and pancreas.

Back to my question, is the legalisation of utilising cloned embryos a step we should be taking from both an ethical, and practical standpoint? Let's not forget, that should research bodies really need embryonic stem cells, they ca be acquired with parental consent in cases of miscarraige, and the like.

In addition to which, why are we being sold on the idea of embryonic stem cells only, when adult stem cells have exhibited a comparable degree of differential malleability, and can be harvested for what must be a fraction of the cost of growing cloned embryos? Is this just a case of the detrimental impact of the scientific "soft sell"?

GuanYin

AngryBadger wrote:

I'm familiar with both the regs, and principles involved here. My point,which I'll grant is venturing into the philosophical, is that authorizing the use of cloned embryos is a step closer to cloning humans,and I don't see the benefit of this line of research being brought to its' conclusion.

Well how far back do you draw the line? Authorised use of viruses and bacteria is a step closer to creating biological weapons. Authorised use of radioactive materials is a step closer to building a nuclear weapon.

Any tool can be mis-used or used unethically or illegally, but the safeguard sin place here make it very difficult to do covertly.

AngryBadger wrote:

Raleans didn't enter my mind during this post, but let's be realistic, the process used to create Dolly is not a particularly elegant one, and it is very much transferrable to the human species. The only reason this hasn't already occured is, as you correctly observe, the ethical objections that would result from the public at large.

No, the only reason that it hasn't occured is because the ethical laws in place prevent it. Those that don't have the ethical laws don't have the technology and find it har dto aquire the tools and expertise.

AngryBadger wrote:

Again though, what I'm querying here is why we're authorizing cloning embryos at all, and isn't it a step closer to the real deal of cloning adult humans?

How are we a step closer? None of the embryos could form viable foetuses and noone has approved researching the tchnology to do that. By your own arguement, cell culture and genetic transfection with human cell lines is also one step closer to cloning a human as many of the principles and techniques are the same. Should we stop those too? If not why not?

AngryBadger wrote:

To clarify the current state of stem cell research. Yes, the ideal is to generate in vitro complete, functional human organs from the patients own material. But right now all research has reliably shown is that stem cells exhibit a high degree of plasticity. Scores of papers have presented work showing the development of multiple classes of tissues from cultures of stem cells. However, we're nowhere near the level of knowledge, and control necessary to generate whole organs.

Well we are no where near the level to grow humans to harvest organs from, yet you were quick to express concerns about this happening. Now you feel that a much simpler concept is far away. So which do you think is going to happen first?

AngryBadger wrote:

Moreover, as many papers as are based on embryonic stem cells, an equal number have been based on using populations of adult stem cells, and these cells have shown a comparable degree of plasticity to embryonic stem cells. And for the record, the bone marrow is not the only area known to possess stem cells in adults. Offhand, I know I've read several papers reviewing stem cells cutures taken from the liver, and pancreas.

The bone marrow is the one that has had the most success in harvesting viable cells, and the evidence with the other sources is so far behind that to focus on them now would set the field back 5 years and billions of research dollars. If you actually look at the source literature and the institutes involved in those papers diverging from embryonic sources some of the papers are poor and the insititutes commercial.

AngryBadger wrote:

Back to my question, is the legalisation of utilising cloned embryos a step we should be taking from both an ethical, and practical standpoint? Let's not forget, that should research bodies really need embryonic stem cells, they ca be acquired with parental consent in cases of miscarraige, and the like.

Now which is more ethical using a relatively simple and controlled technique or pressurising grieving couples into allowing their miscarried children to be "processed". Obviously you have never met anyone who has just miscarried

AngryBadger wrote:

In addition to which, why are we being sold on the idea of embryonic stem cells only, when adult stem cells have exhibited a comparable degree of differential malleability, and can be harvested for what must be a fraction of the cost of growing cloned embryos? Is this just a case of the detrimental impact of the scientific "soft sell"?

No they haven't. The data on adult stem cells is nowhere near as reproducable as embryonic. In fact serious question marks lie over some of the publications citing success in adult stem cell differntiation. There has, on the other hand, been considerable advances with embryonic work.

You're concerns are unfounded. What exactly do you think will happen with human cloning? What evidence do you support these arguments with?

AngryBadger

I'm saying that legalised cloning of embryos for stem cell research raises a lot of ethical issues. When do we decide an embryo is not a person,(I realise this is a little trite, but it's a valid point), I'm also asking how we justify such a radical move when the research doesn't wholly support it.

Now to your individual points.

syke wrote:

Well how far back do you draw the line? Authorised use of viruses and bacteria is a step closer to creating biological weapons. Authorised use of radioactive materials is a step closer to building a nuclear weapon.

I'm not suggesting we stop every change on the basis that in some far-flung reality the products could be employed for nefarious purposes. I'm saying,
1)Human cloning, as you've stated,is not performed because of the legislative obstacles to it, but the technology exists with which someone could clone a human if they had a mind to
2)Legislating for the use of cloned embryos is a significant step, and it's a step that some researchers will see as one move closer to cloning an actual person

So, the ability is there, this legislation sets a dubious precedent, erego I don't think it's entirely unreasonable to think that some will view it a prelude to opening the floodgates.

No, the only reason that it hasn't occured is because the ethical laws in place prevent it. Those that don't have the ethical laws don't have the technology and find it har dto aquire the tools and expertise.

Now that's a fantasy. We're all too aware of the ready capability of various nations to produce biological weapons, and so on, and so forth, nations that would not have these ethical laws. To say that a country lacking the laws, also lacks the expertise, and technology is...misguided.

How are we a step closer? None of the embryos could form viable foetuses and noone has approved researching the tchnology to do that. By your own arguement, cell culture and genetic transfection with human cell lines is also one step closer to cloning a human as many of the principles and techniques are the same. Should we stop those too? If not why not?

At no time did I say that any of this should be stopped, what I did say was that this question was most likely a philosophical one, addressing the question of whether or not this is setting a troubling precedent for future research. I'm not sure where you're going with the second statement.

Well we are no where near the level to grow humans to harvest organs from, yet you were quick to express concerns about this happening. Now you feel that a much simpler concept is far away. So which do you think is going to happen first?

The ability to clone a human already exists. Again, I feel I need to re-iterate that I'm not talking about the technical ramifications of this work enabling us to clone humans. Knowing what we know, we could already conceivably clone a human being. Again, I'm not sure what your point is.

The bone marrow is the one that has had the most success in harvesting viable cells, and the evidence with the other sources is so far behind that to focus on them now would set the field back 5 years and billions of research dollars. If you actually look at the source literature and the institutes involved in those papers diverging from embryonic sources some of the papers are poor and the insititutes commercial.

The reference I made to the presence of stem cells in tissues other than bonw marrow was an attempt to make the point that embryonic stem cells are not needed. I don't think we have sufficient data on either adult, or embryonic stem cells to say one is a better alternative. We can't control the development of embryonic stem cells at present, but they may show greater plasticity. On the other hand adult stem cells show reduced plasticity, but the fact that they are already partially differentiated into cells that will ultimately form a much more limited number of tissue types wshould in theory make their controlled maturation easier.

As to a lot of adult stem cell research being commercial...I fail to see the relevance of that in the context of this discussion.

Now which is more ethical using a relatively simple and controlled technique or pressurising grieving couples into allowing their miscarried children to be "processed". Obviously you have never met anyone who has just miscarried

That was a cheap shot. But since you took it I'll respond by pointing out that we do this all the time. Are you unaware of the fact that donor organs tend to come from deceased individuals, and a great deal of these individuals don't carry donor cards, which means their grieving relatives are tasked with the unpleasant decision of whether their viable tissues might be used to help someone else.

No they haven't. The data on adult stem cells is nowhere near as reproducable as embryonic. In fact serious question marks lie over some of the publications citing success in adult stem cell differntiation. There has, on the other hand, been considerable advances with embryonic work.

You're concerns are unfounded. What exactly do you think will happen with human cloning? What evidence do you support these arguments with?

I contest this point utterly. I concede that embryonic stem cells show much greater plasticity. This same plasticity is what makes their differentiation so difficult to control. Whereas in adults you already have populations of stem cells scattered throughout the body which are primed to develop into limited groups of specific tissues. We still can't control this differentiation, but it would surely prove easier than directing the differentiation of a cell that has the capacity to develop into any tissue.