Therapeutic Cloning
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CAMR: Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer | FAQ | Facts |
Cloning simply means making copies of a single molecule, cell, virus or bacterium. In Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer (SCNT), the nucleus of a donor’s unfertilized egg is removed and replaced with the nucleus of a patient’s own cells, like a skin, heart, or nerve cell. These types of cells are called somatic cells. Therapeutic cloning is the transplanting of a patient's own DNA into an unfertilized egg in order to grow stem cells that could cure devastating diseases. SCNT holds great promise for treating and curing patients by creating tailor-made, genetically identical cells that their bodies won't reject. Therapeutic cloning produces stem cells, not babies. With therapeutic cloning, there is no fertilization of the egg by sperm, no implantation in the uterus and no pregnancy. The main purpose of SCNT is to perform research to understand how cells develop. Once that is understood, the process can be replicated in a laboratory and there will be no need for new eggs.
Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer
SCNT: wiki | AAMC | NCBI | ISSCR |
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NAS -- National Academy of Science
NAS Info: In the somatic cell nuclear tranfer technique, stem cells that are genetically identical with the cells of a recipient's own body could be derived. A somatic cell is any cell other than a sperm, egg, or cell that gives rise to a sperm or egg. The nucleus of the egg (containing its DNA) is removed and replaced with the nucleus (and its DNA) of a somatic cell (such as skin or blood) from the recipient. The egg containing the transferred nucleus is then encouraged to divide until it reaches the blastocyst stage, at which time the cells of the inner cell mass are removed and cultured. The resulting stem cells would be immunologically compatible with the recipient's own tissues because they would not contain DNA that produces proteins that the recipient's body would react to as "foreign."
Nature magazine 2002 |
Cloning by nuclear transfer from adult somatic cells is a remarkable demonstration of developmental plasticity. When a nucleus is placed in oocyte cytoplasm, the changes in chromatin structure that govern differentiation can be reversed, and the nucleus can be made to control development to term.
Princeton University | Images |
Stem cell basics | tutorial | differentation | blastocyst | pluripotent | blastocyst diagram | derivation | Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer | SCNT Tutorial |
Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer by William Neaves, PhD | PDF File |
The Stowers Institute for Medical Research seeks more effective means of preventing and curing disease through basic research on genes and proteins that control fundamental processes of cellular life.
Stowers Institute for Medical Research |
