Experiments With Stem Cells & Parkinson's Disease

Stem cells may cure diseases, decrease symptoms and treat injuries. In Parkinson's disease the main focus is making the brain produce the neurotransmitter dopamine. Damage to the cells in the brain that produce dopamine is what causes the most symptoms in Parkinson's disease.

Significance

• Stem cells are unspecialized, which means they can continue to divide and make more of themselves for as long as the person or animal is alive. They can sometimes be made to turn into certain types of cells, such as brain, intestine or kidney cells. Therefore they can keep repairing or renewing and they can potentially replace damaged cells.

Neurotransplantation

• In Parkinson disease, dopaminergic neurons are destroyed. J. William Langston, of the Parkinson's Institute in Sunnyvale, California, says that stem cells may be able to be put into the brain to replace these damaged nerve cells.

Embryonic Stem Cells

• Brain cells from embryonic stem cells cause dramatic improvement of Parkinson's symptoms in rats; however, it also causes many to develop brain tumors. University of Rochester Medical Center and other researchers are working on solving the problem.

Animal Stem Cells

• One research study at the National Institute of Health showed ability to use human stem cells to repair rats with Parkinson-like disease, and it is hoped that using animal stem cells may work to help human Parkinson's disease patients.

Creating Stem Cells

• Skin cells can be made into cells resembling embryonic stem cells. However, these cells have a problem with becoming cancer-causing. Whitehead Institute has discovered a way to remove the genes that cause cancer and is working on refining the process.

Considerations

• Research has been delayed due to controversy as most stem cells have been taken from fetal tissue, mostly from legal abortions. The controversy is a major reason for research using animal stem cells even though they are more difficult to use than human stem cells.