Anti-Aging Today!

FactCheck.org: Obama’s Stem Cell Spinning

An Obama-Biden radio ad hammers McCain for being opposed to stem cell research. Not true. Meanwhile two spots from the McCain-Palin campaign, together with the Republican National Committee, describe McCain’s support for the research; they’re largely accurate.

By saying that “John McCain has stood in the way – he’s opposed stem cell research,” the Obama ad seriously misstates the view that McCain has held on this issue since 2001, when he began backing embryonic stem cell research, a position that was out of step with that of many of his fellow Republicans.

The McCain/RNC ads would probably lead listeners to believe that Palin shares McCain’s views on this topic. That’s not true. But we find that to be a minor flaw compared with the misrepresentation in Obama’s ad.

InteliHealth:

Most diseases are caused by the death of healthy cells in a particular organ. For example, diabetes is caused by the death of insulin-producing cells in the pancreas (an organ that lies beneath the stomach); Parkinson’s disease is caused by the death of brain cells that produce a chemical called dopamine; and heart attacks cause the death of heart muscle cells. Almost all the organs in our bodies cannot, on their own, replace the cells that die (the liver is an exception). Nor have we discovered medicines that prompt our bodies to replace dead cells.

Stem cells have the capability to replace cells that have died, in different organs. In mice, stem cells have in fact replaced dead cells, and cured the mice of particular diseases (including heart muscle damage). That is why there is such excitement about using stem cells for what is called “cell therapy.”

* The Basics of Stem Cells
* The Unique Capabilities of Stem Cells
* How Stem Cells Help Treat Human Diseases
* Making Embryonic Stem Cells
* The Ethical Debate Over Embryonic Stem Cells

Gene Treatment in Mice Makes Old Liver Cells Young on Yahoo! Health

An experiment that improved the natural cellular garbage-disposal system in mice made old liver cells act young again. And the same rejuvenating effect might be possible one day in the brain and other body parts of humans, researchers report

Health News: Designer Medicine: Duke’s individualized genomic-guided care is changing the way medicine works: DukeMedicine HealthNews Frontiers takes a periodic look at leading trends and technologies emerging from research centers at Duke Medicine

In the future, people who suffer from a particular disease will be able to have their deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA)–the hereditary material in all organisms–sreened so that doctors can prescribe the drug that will precisely target their condition–and perhaps equally important, exclude the drugs that won’t work–with the help of the Human Genome Project.

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This massive study of human DNA found that while we share 99.8 percent of our genes with other humans, differences in the remaining 0.2 percent determine our proclivity to develop illnesses–heart disease, for example–as well as our response to treatments.

In a series of pioneering programs at Duke’s Institute for Genome Sciences & Policy (IGSP), researchers and clinicians have mobilized their energies and resources to discover how individual genomic variations can be used to better manage health and disease. Fighting disease with precision-guided medicine, often tailored to the individual, is one outcome of this research.” We are taking the groundbreaking position that the genome will dramatically enhance our ability to give individualized care to both patients and healthy people,” says Geoffrey S. Ginsburg, MD, PhD, director of the Center for Genomic Medicine, one of seven centers comprising Duke’s multi-disciplinary Institute for Genome Sciences & Policy (IGSP) (www-genomestohealthcorg). The unique structure of this institute unites biologists, genome scientists, clinicians, policy analysts and educators in an environment directed at making information from the Human Genome Project clinically relevant, economically feasible, socially acceptable and legally possible.