Fracture Putty Can Heal a Broken Bone In Days 236
An anonymous reader writes "If we break a bone it can take weeks or even month to heal depending on the type and severity of the break. In some extreme cases the complexity of the fracture can make it impossible to heal properly. Researchers at the University of Georgia Regenerative Bioscience Center have come up with a new solution for healing broken bones that cuts recovery time to days. It relies on the use of stem cells that contain a bone generating protein. These cells are injected in gel form directly into the area of the broken bone, where they quickly get to work forming new bone. The end result is very rapid recovery, possibly sidestepping the muscle atrophy that can come with long bone healing times. The gel has been proven to work on animals as big as a sheep and has funding from the DoD. Lets hope it is proven to work on humans in the coming years."
Re:How "silly" is it, though? (Score:2, Informative)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silly_Putty
Adult stem cells better then fetal? (Score:5, Informative)
Three nice things about them:
1) They are usually harvested from the entity translated too so less problem with rejection ( is this the case here the article didn't say).
2) The have been proven to work and use in many other places.
3) No one has any moral objections to them.
So many good reasons to not even worry about fetal stem cells , but no one ever bothers to talk about that.
Re:They still have to be your own cells, right? (Score:4, Informative)
Said it was developed from stem cells - but, it is a gell containing a bone generating protein.
Re:They still have to be your own cells, right? (Score:5, Informative)
I had my ankle fused recently and part of the procedure was some kind of putty that they infused with a small sample of marrow they scraped from right below my knee. My recovery was about a month, but it worked remarkably well. I am not sure how that compares to the procedure in this article, but it is not hard to harvest the needed stem cells from the patient themselves.
Re:Adult stem cells better then fetal? (Score:5, Informative)
Right now, Fetal Stem cells have many more advantages.
Except that these are multipotent, not pluripotent stem cells, and therefore, we're not talking about fetal stem cells.
The sources for MSCs include "umbilical cord blood, adipose tissue, adult muscle or the dental pulp of deciduous baby teeth"... but not fetal stem cells.
Nice try, though...
That's similar: (Score:4, Informative)
Using stem cells for skin healing:
http://www.thatvideosite.com/video/the_skin_gun [thatvideosite.com]
Re:Adult stem cells better then fetal? (Score:5, Informative)
Would it have been so hard to not be a bigot and just provide at least one source?
Perhaps 'Stem Cell Basics': http://stemcells.nih.gov/info/basics/basics5.asp [nih.gov]
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While decrying zealots make sure you don't see one in the mirror.
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
Re:They still have to be your own cells, right? (Score:5, Informative)
You have a decent supply of stem cells that should work just fine, right in your body.
Re:NOW they develop this... (Score:5, Informative)
This is only true because it is easier and more economical to destroy the blastocyst for collection than it is to harvest single cells from them nondestructively.
This then causes a viscious circle, in which researchers requiring access to fresh embryonic cell cultures are strapped for cash and labspace/time, because they are denied funding, because of destructive collection techniques. Being strapped for cash and time, they can't realistically use nondestructive techniques using the limited funds they get from private investments, and still do their research... necessitating destructive collection. (Which in turn, reinforces the situation where they don't get grant money.....)
The solution is to offer grant money with the hardlined requirement of nondestructive collection. When the majority of embryonic stemcell collection is non-fatal to the embryos, then the religious types won't object to the collection and research.
The scientists cannot really be the ones to act here; they are strapped for research funds enough already, and are the victims of the viscious circle. The ones that need to act are the religious politicians who are currently ignorant/recalcitrant of the non-destructive alternatives. (These non-destructive approaches have been around since the 90s, when the whole embryonic stemcell shitstorm started. I remember a c-span segment late on a Saturday night with a cellular biologist giving a presentation against the stemcell funding ban to a practically empty building. The politicians had scheduled his presentation for a time when they wouldn't be there. The whole basis of his presentation was the refutation of the "embryonic stemcells == murder" partyline that was driving the ban's momentum. It was a very good presentation, but again, nobody was in attendance.)
If you ask the hardnosed "embryonic stemcells are murder!" Religious crowd what they would think if the cells could be harvested without destroying the blastocyst, thus preserving it for future implantation, you will find that they react with shock, curiosity of if that's true, and then curiosity/anger of why that isn't done exclusively.
The problem is not that the tissue comes from blastocysts. The problem is that the blastocysts are destroyed. This is only necessary because of the funding restrictions an.d the added costs and culture times associated with single cell extractions.
Fix the funding problem with some limiting verbage to require nondestructive collection, and the whole ethical tapestry dissolves like cotton candy in a rainstorm.
Of course, the real challenge is getting the willfully ignorant in government to realize what they are doing.... as the poor researcher found out the hard way. I don't remember his name, but whoever he is, I do applaud the effort.
Re:NOW they develop this... (Score:5, Informative)
I've only seen conservatives and the religious get their panties in a twist over fetal stem cell research. Back in the day, W made it as explicit as possible that he was only banning fetal stem cell research.
Re:NOW they develop this... (Score:4, Informative)
>I've only seen conservatives and the religious get their panties in a twist over fetal stem cell research. Back in the day, W made it as explicit as possible that he was only banning fetal stem cell research.
1) Back in the day when he made that ban, there wasn't any other kind. The adult stem-cell harvesting techniques only got invented to get around the ban.
2) Even then it was stupid. Nobody was proposing doing special abortions for stem cells, just using the ones from the abortions happening anyway. Even then that wasn't required - fetal stem cells don't require abortions at all and could even then be harvested in quantity from things like the placenta and umbilical cord.
So there was a massive ready supply being dumped in the medical waste basket at every hospital maternity ward in the world for no reason whatsoever.
Now while the discovery of adult stem-cell harvesting opened up some useful new avenues of treatment, the fact is that the gap between the ban and that development greatly slowed down massive areas of research and many treatments that may have been becoming available now will still be away for several years - years during which many patients will die who would have lived if not for that ban.
So much for a pro-life law.