February 20th, 2004
New Type of Stem Cell to Repair Brains?
The Howard Hughes Medical Institute reports that researchers have identified a new type of stem cell in the brain that probably already functions to repair damage. This work opens the door to a new set of near future techniques to treat neurodegenerative disorders like Alzheimer's and Parkinson's - a topic high on the "must have" list for extending the healthy human life span through regenerative medicine. You can replace everything else with transplants or artificial organs if necessary, but you can't replace the brain: your original thinking equipment has to be repaired in situ. Some high quality commentary on this research can be found at FuturePundit and Brain Waves.