Research Proposal

Amanda Seidel

Professor Kerley

ENGL 102

4/10/11

Research Proposal

Stem cells are found in most, if not all, multi-cellular organisms that are able to renew themselves through the process of mitotic division. Their most central characteristics that can make them so imperative is the ability to differentiate into a very wide spectrum of specialized cells including more stem cells.  According to the Journal of American Medical Association, an article titled “Stem Cell Research” written by Irving Weissman explains the model that has been studied many times over, mouse hematopoeisis, long term self renewal is for hematopoietic cells and all of the downstream oltiopotent progenitors do not have the self-renewal and depend on the HSC input to continue to allow them to regenerate over time. Seeing this, it is evident that self-renewal is invested in populations of stem cells that are found in tissues and may be the only cells that are important for the life long tissue regeneration. Such cells are very helpful in the development of building tissues and are kept throughout the organism’s adult life to continue to regenerate the tissues. In today’s society there are many ethical and political issues that surround the development of more research on embryonic stem cells. This is then put into the hands of the physicians to determine on their own if the welfare of the patient or their personal ethics will take over the way they practice medicine.

            In another article written by Bin-Bin et al. found in the Journal of Cancer Research and Clinical Oncology titled “Adult stem cells and cancer stem cells: tie in or tear apart?”, they discuss how a new cancer therapy has been found by isolating the cancerous stem cells in leukemia, breast, and brain cancers, allows for a possible way to eliminate cancer. Cancer stem cells share the same properties of self-renewal as other stem cells; some think that they arose as a result of a mutation of the normal stem cells or that it is possibly from a different origin.

Although stem cells are used for only good in hospitals and other medical establishments, there are still people that do not ethically agree with the therapy. Whether it be from the baby or the adult, these stem cells serve a very good purpose in the possibility of finding cures to many different diseases that cold save thousands if not millions of lives in the future.  In the article The Ethical Case against Stem Cell Research by Soren Holm, he discusses the most common arguments against stem cell research in every stage of life that they can be taken from. He goes ahead and states that the “human individuals is intrinsically valuable at all stages of life. Killing or destroying a human being is there fore always pro tanto wrong”.

To continue my research bout stem cells I will continue to read different articles as well as books for and against stem cells to be able to get a different perspective on each. My research will ultimately show that stem cells are a beneficial medical practice seeing that they can save millions of lives every year without killing the patient that the cells are being taken from.