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Cells Block Blindness, Restore Heart Rhythm

Tracy Hampton, PhD

JAMA. 2004;292:2202-2204.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text and any section headings.

New reports showing that stem cells can prevent vision loss in mice with a blinding eye disorder and restore heart rhythm in pigs with abnormally low heart rates bolster predictions that stem cell technology will have broad medical applications. Such studies bring the technology closer to clinical application, even as restrictions have been placed on the use of stem cells derived from human embryos. In 2001, the Bush administration limited federally funded researchers to the use of 78 existing lines, but only about a dozen are currently useful for research purposes.

The healthy mouse retina contains few cone photoreceptors, stained red, relative to rods, stained green (left, upper and lower images, respectively). Mice with an inherited blinding disorder have few cones or rods (middle, upper and lower images, respectively). Injecting stem cells into the eye of such a mouse prevents the loss of cones but not rods . . . [Full Text of this Article]

NO BLIND MICE?



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