Embryo clones of two men created

Last update: January 17, 2008 - 11:33 PM

EMBRYO CLONES OF TWO MEN CREATED

Scientists at a small biotechnology company say they have used cloning to create human embryos from the skin cells of two men. The work represents a step toward the promise of creating personalized embryonic stem cells that could be used for medical treatments. Although the embryos grew only to a very early stage, the work could also theoretically be seen as a step toward creating babies that are genetic copies of other people.

Scientists at Stemagen of San Diego said Thursday that they were the first to use human adult cells to create cloned embryos that advanced to the stage known as a blastocyst, from which embryonic stem cells typically are extracted. However, they did not derive embryonic stem cells. That left some experts skeptical.

"It's an important step toward the ultimate goal of making patient-specific stem cell lines via nuclear transfer," said George Daley, a stem cell researcher at Harvard and Children's Hospital Boston, using another term for cloning. But he said skepticism would be erased only when stem cell lines were derived.

Stemagen chief executive Samuel Wood said the company first wanted to prove it could clone an adult human cell and was turning to deriving cell lines.

VIRUS LINKED TO SKIN CANCER

Scientists have discovered a previously unknown virus and strongly linked it with the most aggressive form of skin cancer, they reported Thursday.

The cancer, Merkel cell carcinoma, tends to occur on sun-exposed areas of the body like the face, head and neck. Although it is rare, its incidence tripled from 1986 to 2001, and it now accounts for about 1,200 U.S. cases each year, the National Cancer Institute says.

The virus was discovered by a University of Pittsburgh team that includes Dr. Patrick S. Moore and his wife, Dr. Yuan Chang. They discovered human herpes virus 8, which causes Kaposi's sarcoma, the most common malignancy in AIDS patients.

The newly discovered virus belongs to the polyoma family, which has been studied for more than 50 years because other members of the family produce cancers in animals. Although polyoma viruses have been suspected of causing human cancers, conclusive proof has been lacking.

In a report published online by the journal Science, the scientists said that while they suspected that it caused Merkel cell skin cancer, more work was needed to prove it.

BIAS FOUND IN DRUG TRIAL REPORTS

The makers of antidepressants such as Prozac and Paxil never published the results of about a third of the drug trials they conducted to win government approval, misleading doctors and consumers about the drugs' true effectiveness, an analysis has found.

In published trials, about 60 percent of people taking the drugs report significant relief from depression, compared with roughly 40 percent of patients on a placebo. When the less-positive unpublished trials are included, the drugs still outperform placebos but by a modest margin, concludes the report in the latest New England Journal of Medicine.

Previous research had found a similar bias toward reporting positive results for a variety of medications, and many researchers have questioned the reported effectiveness of antidepressants. But the new analysis, reviewing data from 74 trials involving 12 drugs, is the most thorough to date. And it documents a large difference: While 94 percent of the positive studies found their way into print, just 14 percent of those with disappointing or uncertain results did.

NEW YORK TIMES, AP

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