infocus #6 June 2007 Stem Cells in Medicine

The authors explain the difference between embryonic and adult stem cells and why their uses, and means for storage, are so incredibly different.

DOI: 10.22443/rms.inf.1.20

Why are stem cells so fascinating? Besides their capacity for unlimited lifespan, one feature that makes stem cells desirable to medicine is a unique ability to repopulate and potentially restore defective tissues and organs. Following injury, cells in the body migrate to replace and fill up the damaged area. Albeit the human body cannot regrow a lost arm or leg. Given that there are animals whose limbs can regrow, such capabilities have likely been lost during evolution. There are two main types of stem
cells: embryonic and adult stem cells.

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Authors

Dr Tomas Simonsson

Göteborg University, Institute of Biomedicine

Tomas Simonsson received his PhD in 1998 at the Biochemistry department of Chalmers University in Gothenburg, Sweden, where he made the discovery that the formation of a unique DNA structure is critical for the activation of cancer causing oncogenes.He was promoted to senior scientist in 2000, and obtained his postdoctoral training between 2000 and 2005 with Dr. Daniela Rhodes at the Medical Research Council Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge, UK, where he started to explore how stem cells maintain unlimited lifespan. In 2006 he joined the Biomedicine department at the Sahlgrenska Academy of Gothenburg University, with a grant from the Swedish Research Foundation.

Helena Johansson

Göteborg University

Helena Johansson is a first year PhD student in Stina Simonsson’s research group at Göteborg University, with a Degree of Master of Science in Pharmacy. Besides science she has a big interest in synchronized skating. She just recently won the World Synchronized Skating Championship in London, Canada, with Team Surprise, from Landvetter Sweden.

Dr Stina Simonsson

Göteborg University, Institute of Biomedicine,

Stina Simonsson received her PhD in 2000 at the Medical Biochemistry department of Gothenburg University, Sweden, where she studied initiation of DNA replication. She went on to become a BBSRC postdoctoral fellow in Professor Sir John Gurdon’s lab in Cambridge, UK, between 2000 and 2005, where she explored nuclear reprogramming in cloned animals. Stina made the important discovery that DNA demethylation, which is an epigenetic marker of somatic mammalian cells, becomes erased in viable clones. She returned to Sweden in 2004, and currently leads a stem cell research group at Göteborg University, Institute of Biomedicine. Stina is currently funded by the Swedish research council, and she was awarded a female young researcher fellowship from the KAW Foundation in 2000, and was elected Åke Wiberg researcher of the year in 2006.