Posted on 03/22/2016 10:45:48 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Stem cells could help treat people with cataracts and even some who are blind by regenerating eye tissue and replacing flawed lenses, according to new experiments in children and rabbits.
In order for people to see properly, both the lens of the eye and the cornea — the layer of tissue that covers the eye in front of the lens — must be transparent. Current treatments for people who have clouding in the lens or cornea involve artificial implants or donor transplants, respectively, but these surgical procedures can be risky, researchers said.
In the new research, scientists performed minimally invasive surgeries on 12 infants under age 2 who all had congenital cataracts — a major cause of childhood blindness. They removed the children's cataracts, but carefully spared certain cells in their eyes, called lens epithelial stem/progenitor cells (LECs), which could then go on to regenerate lenses.
They found that the infants' incisions healed within one month, and the transparency of their line of vision was more than 20 times better, compared to infants with congenital cataracts who received the current, standard treatment. [5 Amazing Technologies That Are Revolutionizing Biotech]
The finding shows that "we can harness our own stem cells to regenerate a tissue or organ," Dr. Kang Zhang, who led the study and is an ophthalmologist at the University of California, San Diego, told Live Science.
(Excerpt) Read more at livescience.com ...
Cecile Richards most likely disagrees...
The culture of death crowd ain’t gonna like this one...
Wow.
ADULT Stem Cells!
NOT Fetal Tissue!!!!!!
Adult Stem Cell research needs no government funding because the private sector research has produced positive results.
Fetal Cell research demands government funding to pretend a benefit from abortion.
NONE has been found.
Awesome.
That was such a (typically) cheap way Kerry and Edwards pandered to voters back in 2004. Vote for us so federal funds can be used to destroy embryos in order that Christopher Reeve can walk again or Michael J Fox can be cured of Parkinson’s or Ronald Reagan can be cured of Alzheimer’s.
It is fascinating to see the advances in stem cell research made since then and that the destruction of embryos is positively one of the last things necessary to do nowadays.
This is only the tip of the iceberg.
Own stems are the future. Fetals are a joke.
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