ASC Production

An interesting article from Science Daily:

"Now, for the first time, MIT researchers have shown that they can deliver those same reprogramming genes using RNA"

ESC Research

An article at Science Daily on the state of ESC research:

"Dr. Denis Evseenko... placed human embryonic stem cells into culture and, after three or four days, found a small subset of the cells that had lost a key cell surface marker characteristic of the pluripotent state and had gained a new marker that is a hallmark of mesodermal cells"

ASC and Heart Attacks

Encouraging news from Science Daily on combining stem cells (presumably adult) and genetic engineering in rats:

"the researchers observed significant improvements in blood pressure function in the rats implanted with scaffolds seeded with stem cells modified to overproduce Akt1, SDF-1 and HGF"

Glenn Beck on the Atonement

I've started following James White's ministry (Dividing Line). On a recent podcast, he mentioned Glenn Beck giving a presentation on the atonement (on Fox News channel, no less!).

This was too bizarre for words. Here we have a (self-described) Mormon, on a politically slanted news channel, presenting the heart of Christian theology! And doing a better job than many preachers on TBN!

Now Beck's main point is the bad (liberation) theology of James Cone. There's so much bad stuff there, it's easy to find the target.

But Beck nails it in one:

"And when it comes to salvation, how about the concept of grace? Saved by grace. You cannot earn your way into Heaven. There is no deed, no random act of kindness, no amount of money to spread around to others that earns you a trip to heaven. It's by God's grace alone that you are saved. Now, that doesn't mean you aren't supposed to do works and deeds — 'faith without works is dead.' Our work is a demonstration of our faith." (emphasis added)

Odd times indeed.

ASC Research

An interesting article from Science Daily on using adult stem cells to investigate Parkinson's disease:

"iPS cells provide new and exciting opportunities to grow and study dopamine neurons from patients for the first time"

ASC Supply

An interesting story from Science Daily on growing adult stem cells in hydrogel.

ESC and Tumors

From Science Daily:

"Using small molecule compounds that inhibit this pathway, the scientists were able to dramatically reduce the potential of embryonic stem cells to form teratomas [unusual tumors]."

So, we have scientists using human embryonic stem cells (putting them into mice)- in an attempt to figure out how to deal with problems caused by ESC.