Word: cordes
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Even as scientists press ahead with embryo research, exciting news has come from the least controversial sources: the stem cells in umbilical-cord blood and placentas, and even in fully formed adult organs. While not as flexible as embryonic cells, cord and placental cells have proved more valuable than scientists initially hoped. Although about 90% of cord-blood stem cells are precursors for blood and immune cells, the remaining 10% give rise to liver, heart-muscle and brain cells and more. Over the past five years, cord-blood transplants have become an increasingly popular alternative to bone-marrow transplants...
...want to lean out over the edges of science and marvel at what is now possible, visit Dr. Joanne Kurtzberg's program at Duke University Medical Center. Children with blood diseases that were almost certainly fatal a decade ago have got cord-blood transplants that essentially cure them. Now she and her team are taking a more targeted approach by attempting to differentiate cord-blood cells to address heart, brain and liver defects. "I think cord-blood cells have a lot of promise for tissue repair and regeneration," says Kurtzberg. "But I think it will take 10 to 20 years...
...Senate majority leader Bill Frist, once a Bush ally on stem cells and a heart surgeon himself, to break with the President and build a compromise package with something for everyone to like. One bill increases funding to explore sources of stem cells other than embryos, such as umbilical-cord blood. Another proposal outlaws trade in tissue produced by "fetus farming," pregnancies that are aborted specifically to harvest the tissue for research. ("As far as I am aware," Frist admitted when he announced the bill, "this is not a method currently employed. But it is not out of the realm...
Cheerleaders for adult stem-cell research point to progress on everything from spinal-cord injuries to diabetes. Scientists at the University of Minnesota have used umbilical-cord-blood stem cells to improve some neurological function; in a paper published last month, Dr. Carlos Lima in Portugal wrote about restoring some motor function and sensation in a few paralyzed patients. At a recent conference of researchers from around the world, a team from Kyoto University in Japan reported success in taking a skin cell, exposing it to four key growth factors and turning it into an embryo-like entity that produced...
...when a kid will look at the classic telephone, with its keypad, clunky handset and curly pigtail cord, and ask, "What is that?" A phone today can come in any shape, as long as it's a tiny one. Vonage's latest design is as simple as a USB keychain drive. OK, so it requires a PC, but it can be used with any Internet-connected Windows PC- without any software setup...