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Seth Golie Lynn Taylor English 1010 23 April 2014 Argument Essay: Stem Cell Research Superman is the ultimate superhero who cant be hurt and is known as the man of steel. So many kids growing up watched Christopher Reeve play this role of Superman in four different movies through the span of a decade in the 1980s. Then on May 27, 1995, Reeve became a quadriplegic after being thrown from a horse during an equestrian competition in Culpeper, Virginia. He required a wheelchair and breathing apparatus for the rest of his life. So now here lays the great Superman completely paralyzed from the neck down and there is nothing even the most advanced doctors in the world can do to fix him. However at this time scientists and researchers had already been experimenting with stem cell research and had even got to the point of testing it on rats, going as far as injecting stem cells into paralyzed rats and then watching their spinal cords mend. "Stem cells have already cured paralysis in animals," declared Christopher Reeve in a commercial he filmed a week before he died. He lobbied on behalf of people with spinal-cord injuries and for human embryonic stem cell research, founding the Christopher Reeve Foundation and co-founding the Reeve-Irvine Research Center in hopes of one day being able to help all of the spinal cord injury victims have an opportunity to be able to walk again.

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With all of this hope of possibly being able to do such incredible things such as curing paralysis why have we not been able to advance the research more and bring it from rats to humans? The biggest reasons are the moral and ethical questions surrounding stem cell research because of the fact that you have to harvest the stem cells from an embryo. This being said it now boils down to when do you believe the combination of cells becomes actual human life? Some believe the embryo is already human life and should have the same rights as a full grown human and not be able to be manipulated or tested on even though it would be for science and the possibility of curing diseases. The world is almost divided over what to do and actually has different laws and rules in different countries around the world even making stem cell research illegal in some areas including the United States of America. Even though stem cell research is so controversial it should be legalized everywhere because of the many medical benefits including faster recovery time from injuries, its ability to generate replacements for cells that are lost from normal wear and tear, and its potential for treating diseases and saving lives. So what is a stem cell? A stem cell is a cell that has the ability to divide (self-replicate) for indefinite periodsoften throughout the life of the organism. Under the right conditions, or given the right signals, stem cells have the potential to develop into mature cells that have characteristic shapes and specialized functions, such as heart cells, skin cells, or nerve cells. Although most cells of the body, such as heart cells or skin cells, are committed to conduct a specific function, a stem cell is uncommitted and remains uncommitted, until it receives a signal to develop into a specialized cell. Their proliferative capacity combined with the ability to become specialized makes stem cells unique.

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There are two main sources of stem cells; embryonic stem cells and adult stem cells. As their name suggests embryonic stem (ES) cells are derived from embryos (blastocyst) that develop from eggs that have been fertilized in vitroin an in vitro fertilization clinicand then donated for research purposes with informed consent of the donors. An adult stem cell is an undifferentiated cell found among differentiated cells in a tissue or organ, can renew itself and can differentiate to yield the major specialized cell types of the tissue or organ. They are known as induced pluripotent stem cells (iPS cells). The primary roles of adult stem cells in a living organism are to maintain and repair the tissue in which they are found. Stem cell research is emerging as a potential revolutionary new way to treat diseases and injury, with wide ranging medical benefits. It aims to repair damaged and diseased bodyparts with healthy new cells provided by stem cell transplants. Disease and disorders with no therapies or at best, partially effective ones, are the lure of the pursuit of stem cell research. Just thinking of the possibility of curing diseases such as Parkinson's, HIV, diabetes, heart diseases, and spinal cord injuries just to name a few, makes researchers very excited. There are such high hopes that not even the sky is the limit of what could potentially become with stem cell research and where it can take us in the future. Just the fact alone that researchers have already injected a paralyzed rat with stem cells that eventually led to the rat being able to move every joint again and even walk makes me very curious as to when we will be able to use this technology on humans. Stem cell research has been the center of debate of recent times. Unfortunately, the medical application of stem cell technology is caught in a web of ethical dilemmas that is compounded by grave technical hurdles. There are several important issues which

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impinge on the future of stem cell research, which are not only of a scientific or technical nature, but are related to ethical and moral issues on the use of human embryonic or adult cells. The status of the human embryo and human embryonic stem cell research with the present state of technology, the creation of a human embryonic stem cell line requires the destruction of a human embryo. Stem cell debates have motivated and reinvigorated the prolife movement, whose members are concerned with the rights and status of the embryo as an early-aged human life. They believe that embryonic stem cell research instrumentalizes and violates the sanctity of life and is tantamount to murder. The fundamental assertion of those who oppose embryonic stem cell research is the belief that human life is inviolable, combined with the belief that human life begins when a sperm cell fertilizes an egg cell to form a single cell. Everyone that believes in that are obviously against stem cell research in every way because they look at it as taking life just for the possibility of saving lives and curing diseases but with no guarantee. Emmanuelle Passegu, PhD and Associate Professor at UCSF School of Medicine believes that rulings based on faith and religious beliefs instead of on scientific facts have indeed hindered the pace of stem cell research. With the majority of the world being religious they seem to be over ruling of the other people that believe in science and medicine and when it comes down to voting have been able to win in most areas of the world. George Q. Daley M.D., Ph.D. is the Samuel E. Lux IV Professor of Hematology/Oncology and the Director of the Stem Cell Transplantation Program at Childrens Hospital Boston. He is also Professor in the Department of Biological Chemistry and Molecular Pharmacology at Harvard Medical School, he says the biggest limitation remains federal restrictions on funding, which has stifled the field in

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the past decade and slowed down the wider exploitation of pluripotent stem cells in research. With this being said it basically means that he believes that if they could get federal funding for their research that they would be able to make much faster progress in developing the stem cell research. Stem cell research will continue to be one of the most controversial subjects in the world even if they are able to advance it further. Although there are all of the moral and ethical questions surrounding it there is such an opportunity we could be missing out on by not allowing researchers to have the proper funding in order to advance the technology. Seeing how we are already able to cure paralysis in rats by injecting them with stem cells proves to me that we need to make changes in the laws surrounding stem cell research. We need give the researchers the opportunity to do things we never thought possible such as curing diseases that we have no answer for yet, giving paralysis victims the chance to walk again, and the possibility of regenerating cells and saving lives.

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Works Cited Blanpain, Cdric, et al. "Stem Cells Assessed." Nature Reviews Molecular Cell Biology 13.7 (2012): 471-476. Academic Search Premier. Web. 17 Apr. 2014. Brown, Mark. "No Ethical Bypass Of Moral Status In Stem Cell Research." Bioethics 27.1 (2013): 12-19. Academic Search Premier. Web. 10 Apr. 2014. Gibbs, Nancy.Park, Alice.Cray, Dan. "Stem Cells THE HOPE AND THE HYPE. (Cover Story)." Time International (Canada Edition) 168.6 (2006): 26. MasterFILE Premier. Web. 11 Apr. 2014. Greely, Henry T. "Moving Human Embryonic Stem Cells from Legislature to Lab: Remaining Legal and Ethical Questions." Plos Medicine 3.4 (2006): e143-0575. Academic Search Premier. Web. 11 Apr. 2014. Kumar, Sachin, and N. P. Singh. "Stem Cells: A New Paradigm." Indian Journal Of Human Genetics 12.1 (2006): 4-10. Academic Search Premier. Web. 11 Apr. 2014.