2001 - Science

Science

Nobel physicist Clifford G. Shull dies at Medford, Mass., March 31 at age 85.

President Bush gives a prime-time television address August 9 to announce that he has agreed to permit federal financing of embryonic stem-cell research but only with limitations that do not appease fervent opponents and displease researchers, who say their inability to create new lines of embryonic cells will handicap their efforts to find potential treatments for Alzheimer's disease, diabetes, Parkinson's disease, spinal-cord injuries, and other devastating conditions. Only tiny amounts of adult stem cells exist in the body, they are hard to isolate, and it is almost impossible to grow them outside the body, whereas embryonic stem cells can become almost any type of cell or tissue, and they are self-renewing in the laboratory as well as in the body. The House of Representatives has rejected a plan that would allow human cloning for research purposes but not for reproductive purposes and voted 265 to 178 July 31 to ban all human cloning, whatever its goal; the Senate has not acted on the issue. Of those Americans who participate in polls, most approve the president's decision, privately funded U.S. researchers proceed with their work, as do foreign researchers, but nobody knows how many lines of embryonic cells really exist (Bush suggested that there were 60) or how long they will last. Critics say that lack of federal funding will disrupt work on promising research, and that foreign companies will now take the lead in such work. Bush appoints a council headed by University of Chicago bioethicist Leon R. Kass, 62, to explore the implications of stem-cell research, but the president's equivocation leaves many observers troubled.

Worcester, Mass.-based Advanced Cell Technology Inc. (ACT) announces on the Internet November 25 that it has produced human embryonic cells, raising hopes that differentiated tissue can be produced that will be tailored to specific medical problems, Bush condemns the development, ACT denies that it has any plans to clone humans, none of ACT's "therapeutic" clones actually developed beyond the six-cell stage, and scientists say it has made an advance in laboratory technique rather than a scientific breakthrough.