Daley, one of the leading stem cell researchers in the country, feels as if he has been treading water for years. Wearing a crisp white shirt, pressed slacks, and a stethoscope, he paused in the cafeteria of Children’s Hospital Boston one day to grab lunch between seeing patients. Many of them were babies, and a few suffered from the hematologic disorders that have been the focus of Daley’s research—diseases like Fanconi’s anemia, thalassemia, sickle-cell anemia, and childhood leukemias. In 2002, Daley and his colleagues at MIT’s Whitehead Institute published research in which they created cloned embryonic stem cells and used them to treat a blood-based immunologic disorder in mice. But he is not even close to attempting a similar approach in humans, and he was still ornery about the latest example of how alternative approaches to isolating stem cells become exercises in politically twisted science.
Last January, days before a vote in the House of Representatives to loosen the rules on stem cell research, the journal Nature Biotechnology posted an article online, written by a group headed by Anthony Atala at Wake Forest University School of Medicine, reporting the discovery of stem cells isolated from amniotic fluid. These cells reportedly possessed many of the same characteristics of embryonic stem cells, without requiring the ethically problematic destruction of embryos. Atala’s group claimed the cells could be prodded into becoming neural, bone, muscle, fat, and liver tissue.
The White House quickly capitalized on the news. In a report called “Advancing Stem Cell Science Without Destroying Human Life,” the White House’s Domestic Policy Council hailed Atala’s work as “landmark” and part of what it called a growing consensus that embryonic stem cell lines were not necessary to scientific progress. (This report, which Harvard biologist Eggan calls the “Human Embryonic Stem Cell Misinformation Packet,” prompted a corrective letter from Harvard biologists, who claimed that the White House misrepresented their research for political reasons.) Syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer, a former member of the President’s Council on Bioethics, declared the finding “revolutionary” and possibly even “the turning point in the evolution of stem cell research.”
The view from the basement cafeteria of Children’s Hospital was considerably more dubious, and probably more realistic. “It’s the same old bunkum,” Daley said, shoving a pile of oily potatoes around his plate. He argued that this tactic—hyping preliminary adult stem cell research and other alternative strategies at delicate political moments—has been a set piece in the national debate over stem cells since the Bush decision in 2001. “Every time a new paper comes out, this is the breakthrough that is going to solve the ethical problem and change the whole picture,” Daley said. “I’ve seen it time and time again.” He wore an expression beyond cynicism: battle fatigue. “C’mon,” he grumbled. “This is another in a long line of claims of alternative sources of stem cells that are going to chip away at the value of using embryonic stem cells.”
In 2002, Daley pointed out, a group headed by Catherine Verfaillie at the University of Minnesota had reported the existence of an adult stem cell that appeared to possess the same qualities as embryonic stem cells, and conservative opponents of embryonic stem cell research quickly embraced that development as a solution to the ethical quandary. “Five years later,” Daley said, “I still don’t know of any laboratory that has been able to culture those cells. At the least, that says that it’s not a robust platform that is easily generalizable to other labs.” (Earlier this year, researchers at Stanford finally reproduced a portion of Verfaillie’s work, but New Scientist magazine reported that Verfaillie’s original study contained significant flaws. The University of Minnesota has since launched an investigation.)
“Then there were fat stem cells,” Daley continued, reciting a litany of alternative ways to tap into the therapeutic potential of embryonic stem cells. “And mesenchymal [bone marrow] stem cells. Tooth stem cells. Cord blood stem cells.” He paused to shake his head. “Even if we can make other cells to look like embryonic stem cells, ES cells allow you to investigate unique aspects of human embryonic development.”
In the past few months, researchers in the United States and Japan have described a promising way of deriving embryonic stem cells from skin cells (of mice) without destroying embryos—the “Holy Grail of biotechnology,” as The Times of London put it. But it can take years to transfer those technologies to human cells, and as the Verfaillie story suggests, five years can transpire before researchers discover they may have driven into a cul-de-sac.
Daley’s scientific frustration stems from more than just the distraction of alternative techniques. In November 2003, he transferred his large lab group from the Whitehead Institute to Children’s Hospital, with hopes of investigating human cells as soon as possible, and the lab has made progress—in mice. The group produced a splash last December when it reported results of experiments exploring what news stories described as a “virgin birth” technique. Beginning with mouse egg cells, Daley and his team tricked these egg cells, or oocytes, into thinking they had been fertilized (a process called parthenogenesis) and managed to isolate embryonic stem cells from the subsequent early mouse embryos. They view this as a test run for creating human embryonic stem cells in the same way (and according to the team, South Korean biologist Hwang Woo Suk seems to have accidentally accomplished this feat while executing his famously fraudulent human cloning experiment).
