Sir John B. Gurdon and Shinya Yamanaka discovered that mature cells, not just embryonic cells, are capable of becoming any cell in the body.
Posted 10.08.2012 at 11:54 am
4 Comments
Neurons Derived From Stem Cells
Neurons derived from human neural stem cells. The green staining highlights the typical appearance of differentiated nerve cells. Cells such as these could form the basis of future treatments for degenerative brain diseases such as Parkinson's and Alzheimer's.
Yirui Sun, Wellcome Images
Congratulations to John B. Gurdon and Shinya Yamanaka, winners of this year’s Nobel Prize in physiology/medicine for their work on adult stem cells. The two conducted groundbreaking work discovering that mature cells can be reprogrammed to become immature cells, capable of becoming any cell in the body — upending our understanding of how cells work, and providing a less-controversial avenue for research on stem cells.
Gurdon made his discovery back in 1962, working with frogs to prove that cell specialization, or differentiation, is reversible. His now-classic experiment replaced the immature cell nucleus of a frog egg with the nucleus from a mature intestinal cell. This modified egg cell developed into a normal tadpole. Yamanaka’s work came later, in 2006, when he proved genetic manipulation could re-program mature cells in mice into pluripotent stem cells.
“We now understand that the mature cell does not have to be confined forever to its specialized state. Textbooks have been rewritten and new research fields have been established,” the Nobel Prize committee said. You can go here to write your own message of congratulations.
Yamanaka's work was so groundbreaking that Nobel predictor extraordinaire David Pendlebury thought he would win back in 2010, by the way.
4 Comments
To comment, please Login.
Popular Tags
Science
|
|
|
|
|
|
June 2013: American Energy Independence
Five amazing, clean technologies that will set us free, in this month's energy-focused issue. Also: how to build a better bomb detector, the robotic toys that are raising your children, a human catapult, the world's smallest arcade, and much more.
Popular on Popsci
Most Commented
Science
- Scientists Create First Cloned Human Embryo
- Dear Schools: Stop Treating Science-Curious Kids Like Criminals
- State Drops Charges Against High School Student Arrested For Science Experiment
- Mexican Cartels Control Pot Farms As Far North As Washington State
- Buzz Aldrin Wants To Send People On A One-Way Trip To Mars
- Giving White People The Illusion Of Darker Skin Makes Them Less Racist
- Space Tourism's Black Carbon Problem
- What Modern Humans Can Learn From The Neanderthals' Extinction
- Untouched For The Last Billion Years, Water In Canadian Mine Holds Ingredients For Life
- How Do You Make A Painkiller Addiction-Proof?
Most Emailed
Science
- The Week In Numbers: Fire In Space, The First Cloned Human Embryo, And More
- 8 Of The Year's Most Oddly Gorgeous Science Images
- 8 Of The Year's Most Oddly Gorgeous Science Images
- A Zombie Worm And Other Amazing Images From This Week
- A Zombie Worm And Other Amazing Images From This Week
- Cambrian Fossil With Scissor-Like Claws Is Named For Johnny Depp
- First American Mission To Sample An Asteroid Gets Green Light
- High School Students Devise More Accurate Climate Modeling Method
- Wanna Know How You're Going To Survive The Apocalypse?
- This Bacterium Can Do Division, Compute Logarithms And Take Square Roots
Most Viewed
Science
- The Week In Numbers: Fire In Space, The First Cloned Human Embryo, And More
- 8 Of The Year's Most Oddly Gorgeous Science Images
- 8 Of The Year's Most Oddly Gorgeous Science Images
- A Zombie Worm And Other Amazing Images From This Week
- A Zombie Worm And Other Amazing Images From This Week
- Cambrian Fossil With Scissor-Like Claws Is Named For Johnny Depp
- First American Mission To Sample An Asteroid Gets Green Light
- High School Students Devise More Accurate Climate Modeling Method
- Wanna Know How You're Going To Survive The Apocalypse?
- This Bacterium Can Do Division, Compute Logarithms And Take Square Roots
Online Content Director: Suzanne LaBarre | Email
Senior Editor: Paul Adams | Email
Associate Editor: Dan Nosowitz | Email
Assistant Editor: Colin Lecher | Email
Assistant Editor: Rose Pastore | Email
Contributing Writers:
Rebecca Boyle | Email
Kelsey D. Atherton | Email
Francie Diep | Email
Shaunacy Ferro | Email
Today on PopSci.com
Copyright © 2012 Popular Science
A Bonnier Corporation Company. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part without permission is prohibited.
Ravens
Skynet
Matrix
Mutants
Cyborgs
Plague
Need I go on....
Don't be such a fear monger, Robot. Stem cells are opening up hundreds of doors to treating previously deadly diseases, and I am intensely excited for what the next decade will bring in terms of medicine.
DodgeballBoy,
Ya know, the Sumerians noted we humans were tinkered with, why not we play with the gizmos inside us too.
What could go wrong? lol.
However, it was wrote, the Gods made war among themselves. Therefore, in reality, they are not perfect too and maybe not all their choices were correct as well.
I do rather see your point; I want to prevent human suffering via medical science. I just do not want indirectly create problems as well.
Re some now esteemed basic science concepts…:
Betrayal Of The Enlightenment Science Heritage
Three glaring examples of betrayal of the Enlightenment science heritage:
- The Higgs particle case: by plain common sense and data the origin of all mass in the universe is the minuscule pre-big-bang gravitons singularity…
- Life nature and genesis: by plain common sense and data life is just another mass format …
- The Genetics concepts: by plain common sense and data culture and natural selection are ubiquitous and genetics are their evolving RNA nucleotide progenies…
Dov Henis (comments from 22nd century)
universe-life.com/
PS:
1.Ponder why Mass = Energy at singularity…
2.Ponder that Culture is reaction-to-circumstances/drive-to-survival by ALL MASS FORMATS…
3.Ponder the implications of the various modes of Cooperation in nature…
4.Ponder that Intelligence = learning from experience…
5.Ponder that in an evolving two-pole system (m/E, singularity/max expanded) there cannot be randomness…
6. Ponder that in an evolving two-pole system m/E, gravitation is propensity of energy reconversion to mass…
DH