The Implications Of Embryonic Stem Cells

Stem cells are special cells that have the ability to divide for an indefinite period and can give rise to a wide variety of specialized cell types. The term stem cell can be interpreted into many different types of stem cells, each with very different potential to treat disease. There are multiple types of stem cells but the two significant stem cell types are embryonic stem cells and adult stem cells (Panno, “Stem cells are not all equal”). Stem cells have the remarkable potential to develop into many different cell types in the body during early life and growth. This is the highly controversial embryonic stem cells research. To obtain embryonic stem cells, the early embryo has to be destroyed. However, embryonic stem cell research could …show more content…
Scientists were severely interested in stem cells because they provided ways to treat and possibly cure, wide variety of diseases from leukemia to diabetes to neurological disorders. Each year in the United States, nearly 32,000 adults and more than 2,000 children will develop leukemia, a cancer of the blood cells and bone marrow. The two kinds of blood cells are red blood cells and white blood cells. The red blood cells carry a protein known as hemoglobin and use it to carry oxygen to the lungs then to the tissues. White blood cells carry oxygen to the immune system. Leukemia affects the white blood cells known as lymphocytes (Panno, 36). The standard treatment for leukemia involves radiation and chemotherapy, which kills cancerous cells. The extreme form of radiation therapy, involves the complete destruction of the bone marrow. This takes place in order for the patient with leukemia can be suitable to receive new bone marrow. Treatment falls under the specifications of a transplant; a stem cell transplant is infuses healthy blood forming stem cells into the body. It can be used to restore healthy bone marrow and it helps stimulate new bone marrow growth and restores the immune system. Another medical disorder that can be applied to stem cell research is diabetes. Diabetes is a chronic metabolic disorder that destroys the body’s ability to produce and utilize glucose (Panno, 41). Diabetes is major problem in North America; it can lead blindness, heart disease, kidney failure and etc. Stem cell research can be holding tremendous potential in the case of this disorder as source of insulin-producing cells since embryonic cells are pluripotent (Diabetes Research Institute