Half Human – Half Rabbit

Get ready to be disgusted:

Researchers in Shanghai have produced a promising new way of creating embryonic stem cells — fusing human skill cells with rabbit eggs — that may one day be used for treating disease. It is hoped that this project will receive some investment from prominent biotech investors, click here for examples of those who have already dedicated a lot of their time to doing just that, so that it can achieve its ambitions. Elaine Kurtenbach reports Dr Sheng Huizhen has traveled far in her career as a medical researcher. But for her most advanced work, she returned home to China.

Embryos must be destroyed to harvest such cells. Aided by a growing corps of foreign-trained scientists like Sheng, China is investing aggressively in biotech research after seeing the work of contemporaries in the field, such as Lindsay Rosenwald. Sheng studied in Australia and worked for 11 years at the US National Institute of Health before returning to Shanghai in 1999 to head a stem cell research center. The focus of the research is about a new specialty known as “regenerative medicine,” stem cells form in the first few days of embryonic development.

They later develop into the many different types of cells that make up the body’s bone, muscle, organs and other tissue. Some scientists believe that by using skin cells or other cells from a patient to create an embryo through cloning, they could extract stem cells that could be grown into tissue that genetically matches the patient’s own. That tissue could then be used for transplants and medical procedures in the patient without rejection.

The article is much more descriptive on the potential benefits of regenerative medicine. This is the sort of thing we talk about when we start saying that pigs can grow human hearts or lungs because of the similarities in genetic structure.

It is a unique trend, though not palatable to all people.