Stem Cell Therapy

A young boy is paralyzed as a result of a spinal cord injury he received from a stray bullet. He was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Doctors are certain he will never walk again. Many surgeries have been performed unsuccessfully. For the rest of his life, he will depend on a wheelchair to get around. What if there was a way this little boy could walk again? What if humans never had to worry about the effects associated with certain diseases or disabling injuries? Scientists are working on research that could one day dramatically improve the lives of every person in the world. At present, magical cures happen only in movies and science fiction novels. Stem cell research, however, may transform science fiction into a life saving reality.

What are stem cells? Stem cells are very much like most other cells. They have a membrane, cytoplasm, and other attributes associated with cells. All stem cells, regardless of their source, have three general properties that set them apart: they are unspecialized; they are capable of dividing and renewing themselves for long periods; and they can give rise to specialized cell types. One of the fundamental properties of a stem cell is that it does not have any tissue-specific structures that allow it to perform specialized functions. A stem cell cannot work with its neighbors to pump blood through the body (like a heart muscle cell); it cannot carry molecules of oxygen through the bloodstream (like a red blood cell); and it cannot fire electro-chemical signals to other cells that allow the body to move or speak (like a nerve cell). However, unspecialized stem cells can give rise to specialized cells, including heart muscle cells, blood cells, or nerve cells.

When unspecialized stem cells give rise to specialized cells, the process is called differentiation. Scientists are just beginning to understand the signals inside and outside cells that trigger stem cell differentiation. The internal signals are...