Stem Cells + Media = ???

This post is for students in the Issues and Values in Biology course at Seattle Pacific University. I'll be visiting you later this week to talk about how the media interacts with science. There are a lot of great examples of how science is well represented or misrepresented in the news, but I've picked one story from a field I'm familiar with and that hopefully is interesting to you.

Even before President Bush signed an executive order restricting Federal support of embryonic stem cells, there was considerable attention paid to the differences between adult and embryonic sources of the cells. If you aren't sure what is the difference, I'd encourage you to check out this website sponsored by the National Institutes of Health. Knowing the basics will help you understand why I've chosen the following example. There is still considerable conflict - especially in faith communities - about embryonic or adult stem cells. (See my post about President Obama's recent press conference for more details.) The field of stem cells is very large - there's something in the news every week; I'm focusing on one issue that was in the news about two years ago.

In the January 2007 issue of Nature Biotechnology, a group of scientists from Wake Forest University led by Anthony Atala published an article titled, Isolation of amniotic stem cell lines with potential for therapy. (The link needs a university subscription or an email from Dr. Hunter.) The bottom line in this report is a claim that there are cells in amniotic fluid (the nutrient that fetuses consume/breathe before birth) that have some of the same potential to form tissues as embryonic stem cells.

Nature Publishing Group publishes many of the most respected journals in science, and Nature Biotech is one of their gems. Each issue probably generates 5-6 press releases. The relationship between these top tiered journals and the mass media is important. It is the stock pathway for the dissemination of cutting edge science into public knowledge.

Unfortunately, 'cutting edge' in science rarely equates with 'breaking news.' Breaking news is too dependent on context. In this case, the work presented took about 7 years to complete, AND stem cell funding was near the top of the Dems' political agenda for 2009. And when a news story overlaps with politics, there is invariably hype and hope attached to what the science could someday do. (Some social scientists studied this in relation to stem cells a few years ago. If your'e interested, read this paper - you'll need a school subscription or the email from Dr. Hunter.) Did this get published for the hype?

The lab where I got my PhD held a journal club focusing on this paper about 3 weeks after the news broke. (Journal clubs are opportunities to assess for ourselves the merits of a publication, how our experiments might need to change in light of others' results, etc.) Our lab has a reputation for being one of the most skeptical in the field of cardiovascular stem cell biology. The outcome of this animated discussion was unanimous agreement that these cells were much more like (maybe identical to) a type of adult stem cell (mesenchymal stem cells) that are multipotential, but not pluripotential like embryonic stem cells. I could outline about 8 reasons for this conclusion, but that would distract from the real issue I want to bring up: what happens when 6 pages of dense scientific data is condensed to 500 words?

But fiirst, how did this story hit the press? My first contact with the information was an article in a Seattle newspaper. Later, I read an op/ed by Charles Krauthammer suggesting that Bush's decision to limit progress in embryonic stem cell research might have been vindicated with this publication. Initially, I did not catch (but should have expected) headlines like Vatican official ‘rejoices’ in news of amniotic stem-cell discovery and Bush’s Culture of Life ’Confirmed’ by Stem Cell Announcement. Lost in all of the political fallout from this report was a statement made by Atala that this information should NOT be used to argue against the funding of embryonic stem cell research.

Interestingly, when a paper DOESN'T publish science stories, it raises eyebrows. Science writer Michael Fumento announced a cover-up of this information committed by the New York Times when that paper opted not to publish the report. It turns out that their genetics reporter looked at the Atala paper last week and

deemed it a minor [scientific] development.

Hooray for Times reporter Nicholas Wade and his science editor Laura Chang! Ms. Chang went on to say,

There is so much hope invested in stem cell research that we have grown increasingly concerned about prematurely fanning these hopes.

Fumento lamented on his blog that

it's too bad many editors don't realize they have science writers who don't understand - or worse, misrepresent - science.

Exactly! Isn't it strange when we can agree on a statement but not a sentiment?

I believe there are some key questions left to be answered:

1. Why did Nature Biotechnology permit publication of a paper that presented mundane data in conjunction with amazing claims?
2. Is the manner by which science writers collect their information about scientific reports thorough enough?
3. Since it increases visibility of science in general, could it actually be better for science that the public gets this information? (Misrepresented as it may be.)

I look forward to meeting you in class this week. If you were not able to access the scientific papers linked above, Dr. Hunter will make them available to you as .pdfs. Also, feel free to post questions here if you have any before class.

Obama Flubs on Stem Cells

He did just sign an executive order lifting the August 9, 2001 restrictions on Federal funding for research involving human embryonic stem cell (ESC) lines, but President Obama still doesn't seem to understand the science involved in the decision. Of the thirteen questions he fielded in tonight's press conference, the one he did the worst answering was the one from Washington Times journalist John Ward.

Watch the Q&A and then indulge me by reading my take on Obama's response.



Did you catch the sections where Obama displayed a strangely Bush-in-the-headlights look. I'll remind you as we read through it again together.

QUESTION: In your remarks on stem cell research earlier this month, you talked about a majority consensus in determining whether or not this is the right thing to do, to federally fund embryonic stem cell research.

I'm just wondering, though, how much you personally wrestled with the morality or ethics of federally funding this kind of research, especially given the fact that science so far has shown a lot of progress with adult stem cells, but not a lot with embryonic?

PRESIDENT OBAMA: Okay. No, I -- I think it’s a -- I think it’s a legitimate question.

Actually, no! The question is not entirely legitimate. The questioner added on the to the end of his question the words, "especially given the fact that science so far has shown a lot of progress with adult stem cells but not a lot with embryonic." This is horribly misleading. Adult stem cells have been "researched" for half a century. Human embryonic stem cells were first characterized in 1998. The speaker sets up a straw man that the two types of cells are on level ground. So the question isn't legitimate if it isn't true. By calling it legitimate Obama ceded ground because everybody has in their mind that last phrase. To clarify, embryonic stem cells have shown more promise in the past 10 years than adult stem cells did in their first 25.

OBAMA: I -- I wrestle with these issues every day. As I mentioned to -- I think in an interview a couple of days ago, by the time an issue reaches my desk, it’s a hard issue. If it was an easy issue, somebody else would have solved it and it wouldn’t have reached me.

Look, I believe that it is very important for us to have strong moral guidelines, ethical guidelines, when it comes to stem-cell research or anything that touches on,

AWKWARD FUMBLING-FOR-WORDS SILENCE... So this is why you use the teleprompter so much!!! By the way, it's not cool to conflate morals with ethics. Morals can influence ethics, but they are not the same. This confusion is a big reason so many scientists are upset with the religious right. Morals are personal standards. Ethics inform a social standard. By definition, defining ethics is a consensus-dependent activity. Players on both sides of this argument are still not ready to talk with each other.

you know, the issues of possible cloning or issues related to, you know, the human life sciences.

COME ON! "possible cloning or issues related to, you know, the human life sciences?" I would have liked to hear a reference to the main issue here: when do we think humanity begins?

I think those issues are all critical, and I’ve said so before. I wrestle with it on stem cell; I wrestle with it on issues like abortion.

Okay, there it is. Finally, there's a politician willing to call a spade a spade. The reason this debate is so lively is that the pro-life contingent already has a high-functioning political machine... Now we just need some effective communication about how stem cell research isn't the same as abortion.

I think that the guidelines that we provided meet that ethical test. What we have said is that for embryos that are typically about to be discarded, for us to be able to use those in order to find cures for Parkinson’s or for Alzheimer’s or for, you know, all sorts of other debilitating diseases, juvenile diabetes, that -- that it is the right thing to do. And that’s not just my opinion. That is the opinion of a number of people who are also against abortion.

Nooooooooooooooo! Not the C-word! What we scientists are after is understanding that leads to treatments. Politicians LOVE cures. The thing is, there aren't many cures in medicine. (And some ill-informed autism advocates want to take those away from us!) When there is no cure, the adoring crowd supporting research could turn to an angry mob. And another thing: When are the politicians' science advisors going to step in to help them understand which diseases stem cell research is likely to yield treatments for??? Stem cell research might have a chance at curing neurological diseases. There's a chance that Parkinson's could be treated because its a pretty well-defined region of the brain that's affected. Even then, I'm not sure we've figured out how to convince the ESCs to become substantia nigra (that's the region of the brain involved) cells, much less how to get them to integrate. But Alzheimer's Disease (AD)? We still know relatively little about how AD occurs. We know it hits different people differently and have really good tests to identify dementia or to diagnose the disease at autopsy, but even the expensive medicines so many people take hardly work at all. Nancy Reagan pleaded with GW Bush to lift his restrictions because of AD. Politicians who support ESC research use Alzheimer's because 1) a lot of people get it and 2) everyone is scared of it. Okay, so I don't like AD or Parkinson's. What are the diseases that could benefit from ESC research? Try spinal cord injury - the first FDA approved human trial for any ESC therapies is underway already. Diabetes is another good one, though my cynical side believes that disease was thrown in because the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation is one of the biggest science lobbying groups. The disease no one talks about is CANCER. What we are learning about reprogramming stem cells will likely inform future treatments for cancer.

Back to OBAMA: Now, I am glad to see progress is being made in adult stem cells. And if the science determines that we can completely avoid a set of ethical questions or political disputes, then that’s great. I have -- I have no investment in causing controversy. I’m happy to avoid it if that’s where the science leads us.

Fair enough. In an ideal world, we will be able to learn from ESCs in order to reprogram other stem cells to do the same thing. And that is exactly what a couple of scientists did recently with induced pluripotent cells (IPCs). Read about them at Wikipedia. A future Nobel Prize may be awarded for this work... But this work would not have been possible without ESC research.

OBAMA: But what I don’t want to do is predetermine this based on a very rigid ideological approach. And that’s what I think is reflected in the executive order that I signed.

Way to finish strong. Let science ask the questions, but have a more-or-less consensus ethical framework within to let them work.

QUESTION: I meant to ask as a follow-up, though, do you think that scientific consensus is enough to tell us what we can and cannot do?

PRESIDENT OBAMA: No. I think there’s always an ethical and a moral element that has to be -- be a part of this. And so, as I said, I don’t take decisions like this lightly. They’re ones that I take seriously. And -- and I respect people who have different opinions on this issue.

But I think that this was the right thing to do and the ethical thing to do. And as I said before, my hope is, is that we can find a mechanism ultimately to cure these diseases in a way that gains a hundred percent consensus. And we certainty haven’t achieved that yet. But I think on balance this was the right step to take.

The president wisely ended on the ethics part of the question, so finished strong, but I hope that Mr. Obama's science advisers help him understand this topic so that it's not the science question at his next news conference that he flubs.

And I'll be honest with you: in terms of the potential for the cells to become any tissue in the body, I didn't think that the IPCs would stand a chance against ESCs back when they were first derived. But the great thing about science is that opinions only matter until the data comes back. And if you don't accept the data that everyone else does, you can do the experiment yourself. Unlike politics, the central element of all science is honesty and integrity; when proven wrong, the best scientists dust themselves off and start asking new questions. The investigator who does not will soon be out of a job.

Better Than Stem Cells

I don't mean any direct offense to John Marburger by re-posting this cartoon by David Horsey, but today's stem cell announcement reminded me just how lame science had become in the executive branch over the four years.


The coolest part about Obama's speech today was not the stem cell part. It was:

Promoting science isn't just about providing resources -- it's also about protecting free and open inquiry. It's about letting scientists like those who are here today do their jobs, free from manipulation or coercion, and listening to what they tell us, even when it's inconvenient -- especially when it's inconvenient. It is about ensuring that scientific data is never distorted or concealed to serve a political agenda -- and that we make scientific decisions based on facts, not ideology.

That's the part that will actually change how politics uses the information science offers.

What's Wrong?

If you couldn't tell from my post yesterday, I approve of the president's impending action to lift funding restrictions on human embryonic stem cells. While, I've not had the time to post much about this issue, I have been reading others' takes. The Washington Post has a nice blog/column about religion and gives good time to science and religion bits. A piece likening stem cell ethics to organ transplantation caught my eye, because I've thought about this connection before and wanted to read what an 'expert' would say about it. I'd recommend you check out the article by Susan Brooks Thistlewaite, and the counterpoint by Thomas J. Reese, but what I did a doubletake on was this image:
This type of tube is commonly used to store frozen cells, including stem cells. The tube is thawed, because the red media is clearly not a chunk of ice. I'm thinking the photographer wanted an illusion of pipetting into the vial. But in the picture, the scientist is actually pipetting into the cap. There is a good chance that the diagonal tube is a forceps (tweezers), but with the cinematic techniques used so often on CSI and other science-enriched TV shows, I'm still putting my money on the theory that we're supposed to think there's pipet action going on.

Which is all to say, LOL.

This Just In!

Obama to Lift Ban on Funding for Embryonic Stem Cell Research.

Evidently, he will sign an order on Monday to reopen federal funds for ES Cell work. Read all about it in the Washington Post.

Seven Years

August 9, 2001: A day that will live in infamy. (Among stem cell researchers, at least.)

That's when President Bush announced his policy regarding human embryonic stem cell research.

In remembrance of this day, I wrote up my thoughts at the seven year point over at Clashing Culture. In a way, I am glad Bush made that speech. I probably would not have gotten so invested in science policy and the public communication of science, may not have involved myself with FOSEP, and would not have developed a self-conception of myself as a citizen-scholar.

Whoa...

LOL Zygotes

I'z got 2 faces
I zgot 2 faces
1 zygot, 2 faces
1 zygote, 2 faces

And no, I didn't do any Photoshopping on this one. Read all about it!

Middle Ground For Stem Cells?

You've probably already seen the headlines: "Top Scientists Generate Stem Cells From Cloned Skin." My local Seattle paper has a story. So does the NYTimes. Not surprisingly, the Times article is really good. They tend to get it when it comes to stem cell science and politics. The articles there represent the science well and give a good breakdown of the political context of the announcement. But for a better breakdown, read Matt Nisbet's post on his Framing Science blog. He points out that middle ground in the stem cell debate is murky, if it even exists. I think the potential for middle ground would be greater if we could get away from the polarizing environment that make a presidential "I told you so" possible. I'll get to that in a minute. First the science:

Tonight I passed on reading about chronic pain to get the dirt on the research in the Cell and Science articles. And what do I get? Well at first it was a bunch of freakin' press releases and 'digested for the lay public' news articles. I started to think that this was just a ruse to provide a reason for me to give thanks tomorrow when the currency of science - the paper - was released. But then I found the Sciencexpress paper (you need a subscription, of course).

What do I think? These stories look pretty good. Okay, really good. The teratomas look a lot better than the sorry examples provided by the Yamanaka group in July of '07. (The Yamanaka paper in Cell also looks much better this time around.) The pathologist in me wants more than the H&E tissue sections the Thomson group provided. I want to see definitive lineage markers by histology. But none the less, I am pretty impressed. They set out to create a stem cell line that could produce all three germ layers. It looks like they did. The next question is whether these pluripotent cells are as pluripotent and as controllable as the embryonic stem cells. The only way we will know is by doing the experiments. My former dissertation adviser, Chuck Murry, has already put an order in for these cells and should have some in Seattle by January 2008. Can they be coaxed into beating human embryonic stem cell derived heart cells?

(By the way, if you are looking for a more detailed take on the science, please refer to Pharyngula, The Scientific Activist or Dear Science.)

Moving on to the political situation, there is plenty of hot air out there to get indigestion about. Fortunately, there are some level heads to provide the TUMS needed for me to get a good night's sleep.

From the New York Times article.

Karl Zinsmeister, a domestic policy adviser to Mr. Bush who kept the president apprised of the work said, “I don’t think there’s any doubt that the president’s drawing of lines on cloning and embryo use was a positive factor in making this come to fruition.”

Mr. Bush’s critics say he should not be so quick to take credit. They note that the reprogramming method has some kinks to be worked out and say the research would never have proceeded without the initial embryo experiments. The critics say that far from encouraging research, Mr. Bush has stood in its way.

I got queasy reading the first paragraph (the aforementioned presidential "I told you so"). If you will allow me to continue with disease/treatment metaphors, its follower provided the anti-emetic I needed to keep my keyboard vomit-free.

Let's not overlook the quote from the only Republican senator I ever voted for:

“I really don’t think anybody ought to take credit in light of the six-year delay we’ve had,” said Senator Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, the lead Republican sponsor of the bill that Mr. Bush vetoed in July 2006. “My own view is that science ought to be unfettered and that every possible alternative ought to be explored.”

Yeah! I think I would vote for him again!

[tirade]

What's not being brought to the table here is the notion that most of science is not about designing cures! It's about asking questions and answering them. Goal-oriented science and translational research is what pays the bills because it captures our imagination. But when it comes down to the bottom line in biomedical research, we need to understand mechanisms and systems before we go and use some new-fangled therapy in the clinic. Why is this important? I need only cite the unfortunate example of Jesse Gelsinger. Viral gene therapy was not ready for prime time, and a sick kid paid the price. Where do we begin to understand stem cell differentiation?

The thing is, embryonic stem cell researchers have always contended that the goal is to generate stem cell lines that don't need to come from blastocysts. After all, it's a good chance that ES cell-derived tissue replacements would need immune suppression to prevent rejection. If stem cells could be derived from other cells, that would obviate the side effect-prone rejection medicines. Embryonic stem cell research teaches us about cell reprogramming so that maybe there will be a clinical application in the future. Indeed, the same interventions that were used in these (what I think will amount to) monumental papers to generate these ES cell-like cells were studied in embryonic stem cells.

Science is and relies on progress. To say that the shortsighted policy made by George Bush and his puppet show of a Presidential Bioethics Committee is anything but a hindrance to science is not just disingenuous, it's an outright lie.

[/tirade]

And I wonder why we can't all just get along. Let me tell you (and myself): It's because crazies like me are tired of the political misuse and misrepresentation of science.

Churched Stem Cells

You know those polls that separate out weekly churchgoers and Democratic voters? Or that distinguish scientists from folks that consider themselves spiritual AND religious? Well I break both of those molds. If you didn’t know already, I am a church attending, Democratic voting scientist. So shake of the surprise when I tell you that the other day I was sitting in church and the pastor opened his prayer with this statement: “The stem cell of worship is gratitude.” Often in times of public prayer, I usually zone out into my own way of meditating, but you can bet that this time I tuned in!

As a stem cell scientist (Oh yeah – I forgot to disclose above that I am an Christian embryonic stem cell scientist), I have taken full advantage of the metaphoric power of stemness. Believe me, there are plenty of opportunities for so-bad-you-can-groan puns and fantastic wordplay built into my field. Is your stem cell totipotent, pluripotent, multipotent or omnipotent? But from the pulpit?

Any good sermonette should have some numbered points. Let me make two reflections:

1) I am really glad that Pastor Dave (he officiated at my wedding, by the way) brought science into the sanctuary. Granted, this particular sanctuary is in a church situated adjacent to a large public university in liberal Seattle. There is a reason the Clergy Letter Project exists: there is the need to infuse science conversations into church life.

2) From my elementary understanding of theology, this makes sense. Think of stem cells as the progenitor. Whether worship is the act of expressing joy for your situation or it occurs as an activity to support yourself in the context of faithfulness, there is an underlying relationship with God that is dependent on the worshiper’s gratitude. If we approach whatever situation we find ourselves in – whether gifts or challenges – in the context of thankfulness, we may be able to more clearly approach our calling or purpose. This can happen with both corporate worship (as in Church), or personal worship (like when I ride my bike into work.)

I think it is the first point that got me really excited about the pastor’s use of the stem cell metaphor. If the language of science makes it into the sanctuary, can its ideas be far behind?

Stem Cells in WA: Got Private $?

Saturday's Seattle Post-Intelligencer ran a great article featuring the role of private money in stem cell research in Seattle. The internet version of the story features a nice picture of the Three Amigos of the Seattle stem cell scene. Randy Moon, Chuck Murry and Tony Blau have traveled the state to raise awareness and money for their Institute for Stem Cells and Regenerative Medicine. That's right, the acronym is pronounced, "Ice Cream!" But seriously, these professors have testified before state legislators in Olympia, schmoozed local philanthropists, given tours of their labs, and enlisted their graduate students to do appropriate outreach. As campaigners for ISCRM, they also are delegates for science. For that, they get a tip of the hat from me. (Speaking of hats, I resisted the urge to enhance the above image with sombreros.)

Their efforts have not been in vain. Several large donations have come in so far, including from Orin Smith (Starbucks), Jeff and Susan Brotman (Costco), and Scott and Laurie Oki (Microsoft). And it's not just the private donations... the UW secured a highly competitive $10 million stem cell grant from the NIH earlier this year. By the way, the UW rents its South Lake Union digs from Paul Allen (Microsoft).

The part of the PI story I would like to know more about is the recent visit to Seattle by Robert Klein, co-founder the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine. The CIRM oversees the distribution of $3 billion to stem cell research between 2006 and 2016 that California voters passed in 2005. Is it possible that folks are starting to build an initiative process for stem cells in Washington State? I suppose we will have to wait and see...

Photo Credit: Mike Urban / P-I

On the Hill

Today, I am in the other Washington visiting the my senators and representative (or their staffs) to advocate for science. My personal points are simple:

1. Continue to increase NIH and NSF funding.
2. Ask that the arbitrary limits on human embryonic stem cell research be removed and more logical system of oversight be instituted.

I will also put in some words for this great organization on the UW campus called FOSEP. McDermott, Murray and Cantwell are already on board with science, but I suppose it is still good for scientists to be known...

I am here with the Joint Steering Committee for Public Policy. You should consider signing up for their email notification list. (They only send one email a quarter.)

Seattle Stem Cells

The University of Washington is in the news again for stem cell research. This time it's for what might happen in the future rather than positive outcomes from previous work. The large $10 million grant is a type of award called a program project grant (PPG in grant lingo) that is split up between several professors (including my advisor) and labs. The idea is that the different groups share resources and engage in collaborative projects bigger and better than a single lab could conduct. An article in the Seattle P-I describes this in more detail, and the Stranger's Dear Science presents a more interesting opinion. The UW was one of two recipients of this grant. Hopefully, by the time most of this money can be spent, a new administration in the White House will have permitted use of embryonic stem cell lines that aren't outdated like those approved August 9, 2001.

Hooray Stem Cells!

We've known about it for more than a year. After all, it took that long just to get through peer review. But now that it's in the local papers and on NPR, I bet the Murry lab gets a little taste of sciencelebrity. Carol Ostrom of the Seattle Times wrote an accurate account of the Laflamme et al paper to be published in September's issue of Nature Biotechnology, but livened up the story with some juicy tidbits. Here are some of my favorite lines from the Seattle Times article: referring to attempts to get cells to survive after injection,

Finally, they hit on a "pro-survival cocktail" of chemicals plus applying heat to the cells to make them behave.

By the way, this is the area of the report most connected with my research: I make cells behave. I also appreciated,

"We're pleased to be able to provide an example of something that can be done with embryonic cells that can't be done with adult stem cells," Murry said.

For those of you outside of the cell transplantation for cardiac repair field, that's a little barb at a competing group whose leader's name rhymes with 'prepare to reverse ya.' Finally, there is the obligate:

To make the breakthrough, Chuck Murry and his colleagues used the so-called "presidential lines" of stem cells. Those cells are generated from a group of embryos that had already been destroyed before the Bush administration limited research on embryonic stem cells... Murry hopes someday to work with newer lines that would be more suitable for human transplantation.

So you can be a scientist and an advocate for science at the same time! So Chuck... you'll probably be too busy today with interviews and such to read my dissertation draft, huh?

Special props to Justin Reedy who authored the press release on this story, an adaption of which can be read in full on ScienceDaily.

Update 9AM August 27: It's a good thing I saved this screenshot for posterity... Alberto Gonzales' resignation is hogging all the headlines!!!

Dissertation Introduction

If I am doing this right, I just passed a major milestone in the composition of my doctoral dissertation: I wrote the first paragraph. Saving it for the end - the academic cherry on top of the ice cream called a PhD - helped me keep focused on the prize. I haven't been able to 'blog my thesis' like another stem cell researcher and blogger, so this is all you're going to get, or all you have to put up with.

In the United States, cardiovascular disease accounts for nearly 2 of 5 deaths, and each year, one million people experience a heart attack [1]. If a patient survives a heart attack, the heart recovers by replacing dead cardiac cells with a non-contractile scar. No innate regenerative capacity been identified for mammalian hearts [2-4], and no intervention to reconstitute myocardial function by muscle cell repopulation after injury has been approved for clinical use. Cell grafting is an attractive approach to restore cardiac function in the infarcted heart. Recent studies have identified several cell types that form living grafts in the heart, many of which have been shown to improve cardiac function [5-10]. Clinical trials with cells implanted from skeletal muscle or bone marrow are currently underway [11,12] even though major barriers for successful clinical success – graft integration and cell survival – still exist. The fibrosis that rapidly isolates the grafted cells from the host myocardium [13] is a prominent physical obstruction that can interfere with graft distribution and survival as well as electromechanical coupling. We have identified that genetic knockout of the matricellular protein, thrombospondin-2 reduces graft-related scarring. Apart from fibrosis, cell grafts face a basic challenge of survival [14]. If cells successfully engraft into the injured heart, about 90% of them do not persist three days after injection [15]. Immense increases in graft cell survival are needed if cell-based cardiac repair is to become a reality. In order to investigate potential treatments for myocardial infarction, we evaluated the regenerative capacity of mammalian cardiac tissue, identified an intervention to improve engraftment of cardiac cells and developed tools to improve the survival of embryonic stem cell derived cardiomyocytes injected into the heart.

Hopefully that is intelligible. It was written shortly before the timestamp on this entry...

"Christian Faith and Reason"

Around the time the anti-evolution Creation Museum opened back in May, I stumbled upon a new magazine called Christian Faith and Reason. The publisher has an interesting idea: collect scientists, politicians, people of faith, and - really - anyone interested in reasonable discussion about issues related to Christianity to

provide in depth analysis on the most critical matters of faith in a manner that is both intellectually honest and consistent with Christian faith.

Science is an important voice in such analyses. You are thinking, "But I thought science and rational thought contradicts faith." Some of us (25-45%, depending on the survey) scientists don't think that at all. From the Christian Faith and Reason statement of beliefs,

We believe the Bible was divinely inspired, but that it must be interpreted using the faculties of human reason which God bestowed upon us.

The main way I employ the faculties of human reason is with science. I think that providing communities of Christians with a publication that provides multiple perspectives about controversial topics is a great idea especially if science is invited to a legitimate position around the table. And by multiple perspectives, the editors do not just mean all types of Christians: there were atheist and Muslim contributors in August's edition. From the magazine's statement of purpose,

We seek to provide a marketplace of ideas from all sources, especially those which challenge our viewpoint. Our thoughtful responses to those challenges will lead the sincere skeptic to consider the possibility of choosing to believe in God and the message of Jesus Christ.

This represents a moderately evangelical mission, but I appreciate the tolerance embedded in this invitation to contribute. And contributors the magazine is seeking; if after reading the online version, you wish to submit an article, visit this page. The areas covered the most so far have been science (mostly topics in evolution), atheism and topics related to Islam. The fledgling publication has had two online editions and just printed an August edition. I have signed on to contribute scientific articles for the next year, but (importantly for me) will not be responsible for others' content. You can read my primer to stem cells in this month's edition.

I would be interested to know if you think the articles up at this point live up to the ideal of intellectual honesty. It would also be interesting to know how folks respond to the more assertive claims made in a few of the articles - no matter what your background.

Post Wrong About Stem Cells

There is still a long way to go to educate the public about embryonic stem (ES) cells. In yesterday's Washington Post election blog, John Solomon (a Post staff writer) made a blatantly false statement about ES cells. He wrote,

Many religious conservatives, including President Bush, oppose the scientific use of embryonic stem cells because the cells often come from aborted fetuses.

Right... Does a journalist have to be a science writer to check his facts? Here is the truth of the matter: Embryonic stem cells NEVER come from aborted fetuses. They are derived from 5-day old blastocysts generated in the context of in vitro fertilization clinics. This embryo has never been in the uterus, and is a ball of about 100 cells. A correct replacement sentence could be: Religious and other conservatives object to ES cell use because they cells taken from a structure that occurs 5 days after fertilization.

I wonder how widespread this misconception is.

Damage Control...

Today's Science Daily reported a study by a Boston research group (Mark Keating's) that has identified a drug delivery technique using a drug called periostin that could rebuild heart tissue without stem cells. This drug causes heart cells to re-enter the cell division cycle 100 times more than normal 12 weeks after a mouse was given a heart attack. In any other tissue, this abundant increase in division would cause a tumor. But since heart cells hardly ever divide, what they saw was an increase from 0.01% to 1.0% when the marker for cell division (BrdU for my biologist readers) was given for 6 days. Just as a way of reference, that much BrdU given to an animal would cause almost 50% of the intestine to be positive.

These drastic increases in cell division are what is needed in order to harness any latent ability in the heart for cell division. While this group did find that heart function improved after treatment with their drug patch, it is unclear to me whether this is due to the effects of cell division or other effects of the drug, namely different scar properties.

The original document (needing institutional subscription) is here.

America's Next Top Doctor

The confirmation hearings for America's Next Top Doctor are in a couple of days, so hopefully you will start to hear something about that in the media. The first big story I came across came by way of a House Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearing where the former Surgeon General spoke. From what I can gather, Dr. Richard Carmona, a Bush appointee, was interested in applying scientific evidence to the practice of medicine and public health. He was most notably silenced on his perspectives concerning human embryonic stem cell research, and a commitment to comprehensive sex education.

Carmona reported that his Surgeon General predecessors - Republican and Democratic appointees - told him, "We have never seen it as partisan, as malicious, as vindictive, as mean-spirited as it is today, and you clearly have it worse than anyone's had."

It is sad how familiar this refrain has become. From his prepared comments (I recommend listening to these words from his own mouth in an online NPR segment):

"The reality is that the nation’s doctor has been marginalized and relegated to a position with no independent budget, and with supervisors who are political appointees with partisan agendas. Anything that doesn’t fit into the political appointees’ ideological, theological, or political agenda is ignored, marginalized, or simply buried."

For respecting the principle that public health should be based in sound science rather than a political agenda, Carmona's term was not renewed. Let's see if Dr. James Holsinger, the next appointee in line for this will be able to toe the Administration's line. If he does, he deserves to be sacked in 2008. If he doesn't, good for him. Holsinger might be facing an uphill battle; comments denigrating homosexuality have already earned him two 'no' votes on the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, who will be holding the confirmation hearings this week.

Update 7/13/07: Yesterday, Dr. Holsinger testified for the first time. Of note was this statement referring to an anti-gay position paper he wrote for the Methodist Church in the early '90s:

"First of all, the paper does not represent where I am today. It does not represent who I am today," Holsinger replied. He said he was not anti-gay, and that he wrote the paper in response to a request from religious scholars who wanted him to summarize the medical literature.

Which scientist among us has never changed his or her mind in the face of evidence that contradicts previous assumptions or hypotheses? Isn't the point of bringing science and/or rationality into the political process so that people will change their minds to adopt a truer course of action. Somehow this always gets mixed up in that political character flaw known as flip-flop.

Carmoma's prepared remarks to the committee are available here.
A nice NPR review of Holsinger's testimony is here.

More on the Stem Cell Map

Attila over at Pimm has recruited a number of additional stem cell labs for his Stem Cell Labs on the Globe project, and is working through some of the issues related to curating such a resource. Check out this post for more details. You will note that my lab has not yet joined the list...

Fertile Biblical Debate

The hinge for many arguments about stem cell research is the same as for the abortion debate. When does personhood begin? Since, I recently made a post referring to abortion, I thought I would follow it up with a position statement on that topic.

I think the least-read entry on my blog so far is one from last month concerning the theological concept of concordism. I want to come back to that term now in conjunction with a presentation of one Christian perspective that is consistent with the moral use of human embryonic stem cells in research and to an extent does not rule out a pro-choice political perspective.

What follows is a lengthy post by someone without theological training, but who is committed to the struggle of reconciling his personal religious, political and scientific world-views. My intent is not to draw you to anger, but to understand a perspective on abortion that you might have yet to consider.

First, some reminders about concordism:

• Concordism is the view that the biblical accounts, when properly understood, will be in agreement with scientific accounts of the natural world.
• The extent that individuals attempt to reconcile conflicting biblical statements with each other and with what scientific study has demonstrated depends on whether that individual pursues a verse that supports his or her opinion or tries to assemble a comprehensive concordist explanation.
• Concordism occurs in both the literalist approach to interpreting the Bible and in the position that the text concerns the relationship between God and his creation rather than a scientific account written in a pre-scientific era.

I have identified several verses from the Bible that are commonly cited as support for personhood occurring at fertilization. Quotations are from the New International Version, available free here.

These include:

Psalm 139: 13-16
13 For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb. 14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. 15 My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, 16 your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.
Job 31:15
15 Did not he who made me in the womb make them? Did not the same one form us both within our mothers?
Jeremiah 1:5
5 "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations."

Each of these point to God's knowledge and creative activity before birth. This could refer to omniscience or activity even before fertilization. No specific comment on fertilization occurs here. In fact, Jeremiah 1:5 emphasizes God's relationship with Jeremiah even prior to his conception. It is a relationship verse rather than an explanation verse, but some strict concordists might disagree.

Other frequently cited sections in the abortion dialogue are:

Job 3:3
3 "May the day of my birth perish, and the night it was said, 'A boy is born!'
Isaiah 49:1
1 Listen to me, you islands; hear this, you distant nations: Before I was born the LORD called me; from my birth he has made mention of my name.
Psalm 51:5
5 Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me.
Luke 1:41-44
41When Elizabeth heard Mary's greeting, the baby leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit. 42In a loud voice she exclaimed: "Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the child you will bear! 43But why am I so favored, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? 44As soon as the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy.
Luke 1:15
15He will be great in the sight of the Lord. He is never to take wine or other fermented drink, and he will be filled with the Holy Spirit even from birth.
Galatians 1:15
15God set me apart from birth (OR from my mother's womb, depending on translation) and called me by his grace.

None of these say anything precise about the origin of personhood. One of them even makes a nice prescription against pregnant mothers drinking alcohol.

The major references to personhood are:

Exodus 21:22-25
22 "If men who are fighting hit a pregnant woman and she gives birth prematurely but there is no serious injury, the offender must be fined whatever the woman's husband demands and the court allows. 23 But if there is serious injury, you are to take life for life, 24 eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, 25 burn for burn, wound for wound, bruise for bruise.
Numbers 5:11-31
(A long passage about what is to be done if a woman is suspected of unfaithfulness to her husband that treats the husband and wife as the only persons involved in a cleansing ritual. The swelling of the abdomen is fully part of the woman. An irreverent interpretation may be found here.)

These last two actually suggest that personhood is not immediately present at fertilization. In order for one to draw a conclusion about fertilization, a concept from modern science must be retroactively applied to the ancient words. For example, some folks like to think of the unformed body in Psalm 139:16 as the morula or blastocyst (stages of development that occur days after fertilization), but it could just as easily be a 'twinkle in your father's eye' or cosmic dust.

Why are these verses so often cited as supporting a pro-life political perspective? My guess is that people try to apply science and what we know about life today to text from the Bible written long ago. I think that it is wrong to apply new meaning to old words, particularly if you consider them sacred, holy, or (separate from religious significance) just an important account of a moral code.

It is within their right for fellow Christians to offer perspectives that differ with mine regarding this issue. I begin to take offense when people uncritically accept others' uses of words from the Bible - what I consider a catalyst for God's relationship with humans - to support political perspectives that are at the periphery of what it means to be a Christian, and then tell me that my reading is wrong.

So if there are any atheists out there who use the refrain that moderate Christians are complicit with fundamentalists by not speaking out, here is one voice saying, "Wait a minute!"

Thanks to an article by Robert Boomsma for helping identify these verses.