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Scientists in Massachusetts said today they had created several colonies of human embryonic stem cells without harming the embryos from which they were derived, the latest in a series of recent advances that could speed development of stem cell-based treatments for a variety of diseases.
In June, scientists in Japan and Wisconsin said they had made cells very similar to embryonic stem cells from adult skin cells, without involving embryos. But that technique so far requires the use of gene-altered viruses that contaminate the cells and limit their biomedical potential.
By contrast, the new work shows for the first time that healthy, normal embryonic stem cells can be cultivated directly from embryos without destroying them.
That means the work should be eligible for federal financing under President Bush's six-year-old policy of funding only stem cell research that does not harm embryos, said study leader Robert Lanza, chief scientific officer at Advanced Cell Technology in Worcester.
But that is not likely, said Story Landis, who heads the National Institutes of Health stem cell task force, which oversees grants for studies on...