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<div class="rich-text">(This video is no longer available for streaming.) In this 2005 segment, NOVA scienceNOW explores the promise and potential of the emerging field of stem cell research, as well as the maelstrom of emotion and politics that engulfs it. In February 2004, South Korean scientists create a worldwide media sensation by announcing that they have successfully isolated stem cells from a cloned human embryo. NOVA goes inside the Harvard labs of Doug Melton and his colleagues, who are trying to replicate the South Korean experiment.
 Medical researchers see stem cells as a new way of investigating diseases such as diabetes and Parkinson's—and of treating them. But from the start, the field is torn by ethical controversy. In a $3 billion bond initiative in California, the state pits itself against the efforts of conservative politicians in Washington and elsewhere who want to shut the research down. Already ineligible for federal funding, the new science is even threatened with criminalization. The House of Representatives twice passes legislation to punish any cloning researcher with 10 years in prison and a million-dollar fine. 
</div>

NOVA scienceNOW's first story on stem cells covered the hopes and controversies of stem cell research in 2005.

<div class="rich-text">NOVA scienceNOW's first story on stem cells covered the hopes and controversies of stem cell research in 2005.</div>

In 2005, this story covered the hopes and controversies of stem cell research.

Stem Cells: Early Research

Body & Brain

<div class="rich-text"><h3>
 STEM CELLS: EARLY RESEARCH
</h3>

 PBS Airdate: April 19, 2005



 ROBERT KRULWICH:
 
 Nanoshells are little. They're very little. But little things matter.
Remember how small a life is at the very beginning? A fertilized human egg, a
few days after conception, is so small that if we go back to our pin, I could
place the embryo—here we go—on the tip, on the pointy tip of a pin,
which raises the question, "When life is this small, this preliminary, how do
we honor what's here?"


 There are scientists at Harvard—and you're going to meet them—
who say it is sometimes right to use embryonic cells to investigate diseases
and explore cures, while others say, "Yeah, but remember there is potential
life. And we can't end that potential; that would be wrong." And we're going to
show you, very precisely, what it is the scientists do to embryos, so you can
see for yourself, because in the end, finding a balance between hope for cures
and respect for life, that's the challenge. Here's our report from
Correspondent Patty Kim.



 PATTY KIM
 
 (Correspondent)
 
 :
 
 Lauren Stanford is a busy
13-year-old.



 LAUREN STANFORD:
 
 These ones are for, like, swim team. We won the soccer
championships. That one I think I got for high honors.



 PATTY KIM:
 
 And she's got another major project, keeping
herself alive.



 LAUREN STANFORD:
 
 At 7:15, I check my blood. At 9:30, I check my blood.
At 12:11, I check my blood. At 3, or 2:45, I check my blood. At 6:00, I check
my blood.



 PATTY KIM:
 
 Lauren has Type 1 or juvenile diabetes. She's had
it since she was in kindergarten. Unlike some kinds of diabetes, Type 1
requires constant vigilance, counting carbs, checking blood sugar and adjusting
her insulin pump.


 What would you say is the toughest thing about having this disease in your
family?



 MOIRA McCARTHY STANFORD:
 
 It's just invaded every corner of every member
of our family. And everything that we're doing and she's doing is simply just
keeping her alive.



 PATTY KIM:
 
 Oh, wow. So how does this work? What, what does
this do for you?



 LAUREN STANFORD:
 
 It gives me insulin. It's giving me insulin all
around...like, every 10 seconds I get insulin.



 PATTY KIM:
 
 Even with all her high-tech gadgets, Lauren cannot
control her blood sugar as well as a working pancreas.


 There's a needle that actually goes into your arm?



 LAUREN STANFORD:
 
 Yeah, but then you take it out and it's...



 PATTY KIM:
 
 After 15 or 20 years with diabetes, the danger
grows, possibly leading to kidney failure, heart disease, blindness.



 LAUREN STANFORD:
 
 That's a glucagon. You need it when...if you have,
like, a seizure. I don't want to lose my eyesight. I don't want to have brain
damage. I don't want to die of early age. Like, who does? Like, that's the only
thing that scares me.



 MOIRA McCARTHY STANFORD:
 
 As soon as you change, you have to check your
blood. Now.



 PATTY KIM:
 
 But many scientists say that hope may be on the
horizon.



 DOUG MELTON
 
 (Harvard Stem Cell Institute)
 
 :
 
 I do think we can cure
it, and...our research has convinced me that that is going to be possible.
Everything we learn says that it is possible.



 PATTY KIM:
 
 Doug Melton has spent the last seven years
searching for a cure for diabetes. His work is personal; both his children
suffer from the disease.


 Today, he's optimistic about their future, thanks to a hot new field in
medical research which we've all heard about, embryonic stem cells. These are ells that have the potential to become nerve cells, heart cells,
blood cells, any kind of cell in the human body.


 Melton, now co-director of the new Harvard Stem Cell Institute, wants to
turn them into insulin-producing cells so they can help diabetics.


 So far, embryonic stem cells have been made mostly from frozen embryos left
over from fertility treatment, and that, on its own, is controversial. But now,
there's a whole new way for making them that's drawing even more fire. It has
to do with cloning.


 In February 2004, scientists in South Korea announced they had cloned human
embryos and used them to create stem cells for research.



 GEORGE DALEY:
 
 I said, "Wow, they've done it! I wish we had done it."



 PATTY KIM:
 
 Dr. George Daley is a pediatrician who also studies
stem cells.



 GEORGE DALEY:
 
 The fact that that barrier has now been passed, I think,
really motivates a lot of other scientists to say, "We can do it, too."



 PATTY KIM:
 
 Now, when most of us hear the word cloning we think
of the cloning of people, the stuff of science fiction films, both
scary.



 ACTOR
 
 (clip from
 <cite>
 Star Wars
 </cite>
 )
 
 :
 
 They are totally obedient,
taking any order without question.



 MIKE MYERS
 
 (as Austin Powers in clip from
 <cite>
 Austin Powers: The Spy Who
Shagged Me
 </cite>
 )
 
 :
 
 Dr. Evil...



 PATTY KIM:
 
 ...and absurd.



 MIKE MYERS
 
 (as Austin Powers in clip from
 <cite>
 Austin Powers: The Spy Who
Shagged Me
 </cite>
 )
 
 :
 
 He is exactly like you in every way.



 MIKE MYERS
 
 (as Dr. Evil in clip from
 <cite>
 Austin Powers: The Spy Who
Shagged Me
 </cite>
 )
 
 :
 
 Call him Mini-Me.



 DOUG MELTON:
 
 I don't know any credible scientist who wants to do that,
who's working on that. And I think that we, as a nation and as a world
community should outlaw that. There really is no reason to be doing that.



 GEORGE DALEY:
 
 I think it's important that it's clear that we're not
cloning organisms, that we're cloning cells, that we're trying to create cells,
not children.



 PATTY KIM:
 
 So if they're not making copies of people, what
kind of cloning are the scientists talking about?


 Well, they say it would work like this:


 Start with an egg from a woman's ovary. Remove its genes or DNA.


 Then, take a cell, like a skin cell, from a patient and put its DNA into
the egg. This is called nuclear transfer.


 Add a few chemicals and the egg starts to divide just like a fertilized
egg.


 After a few days, it becomes a blastocyst, a ball of about 50 to 200
cells.


 If you wanted to clone a person, then you'd have to place the blastocyst in
a woman's uterus. A similar process was used to create the famous sheep, Dolly.
But these scientists don't want that, so instead, and this is the step that
causes so much controversy, they would break down the outer layer of the
blastocyst.


 It's at this point there's no turning back. The blastocyst cannot develop
into a child, but the remaining cells can become embryonic stem cells, ones
with the exact same genetic makeup as the patient.


 The potential benefits are obvious to doctors like Leonard Zon who sees a
lot of patients needing bone marrow transplants. For two thirds of them,
there's no donor with an acceptable genetic match.



 LEONARD ZON
 
 (Children's Hospital Boston)
 
 :
 
 How are you
feeling?



 PATTY KIM:
 
 Even if a donor is found, the match is never
perfect. Zon says, with cloning, scientists could, in theory, grow cells
customized to an individual patient.



 LEONARD ZON:
 
 If you used embryonic stem cell technology, you might be
able to generate embryonic stem cells that have the same immune system as the
patient. You'd have less chance of rejection, and we would hope that there'd be
a less death rate
 

 associated with that.



 PATTY KIM:
 
 With cloning, this little boy, in theory, could get
bone marrow cells that perfectly match his body.


 But there's much more to cloning than custom-made transplants. The thing
that has scientists all over the world really excited is that cloning could
allow them to do something completely new and different: make sick cells. Now
why would they want to do that?


 Well, let's say you could take a cell from a patient—someone like
Lauren—create a clone, let it grow in the lab until it's a blastocyst,
make stem cells. Then you could watch the cells as they get sick.


 That's exactly what Doug Melton wants to do.



 DOUG MELTON:
 
 Just like Abbott and Costello said, "Who's on first?" When
you're watching these cells develop, one of them is going to make a mistake
first. One of the genes in the disease cell line is going to screw up. And we
want to be watching it every minute to say, "Who's on first? Who screwed up
first?" If we follow those cells in a culture dish, we can get at the root
cause of the disease.



 PATTY KIM:
 
 If you could learn how Lauren's diabetes got
started, you'd have a much better chance of curing it. This might work with
lots of diseases that right now develop invisibly inside patients. Not just
diabetes patients but Parkinson's patients, Alzheimer's patients.


 That's why, instead of just studying healthy stem cells, scientists like
Harvard's Kevin Eggan want to use cloning to create stem cells that are
genetically predisposed to a disease.



 KEVIN EGGAN
 
 (Harvard Stem Cell Institute)
 
 :
 
 For certain diseases,
it's true that cloning is the only way to do it. By taking cells from an
individual which already has that disease, it does allow us to make embryonic
stem cells that we know carry all the genes that are required for that
disease.



 GEORGE DALEY:
 
 This is one of the frontiers. It's enormously exciting
research. It's very valuable. It's a whole fresh approach.



 PATTY KIM:
 
 Nobody can guarantee that this approach will lead
to cures, and even if it does, tangible results could be five, 10, 20 years
down the road. But right now, it's unclear whether these scientists will even
get started.



 FATHER:
 
 This is the worst kind of science imaginable.



 PATTY KIM:
 
 The Catholic Church, along with many pro-life
groups, has been a major opponent of cloning.



 FATHER TAD:
 
 Making human life simply to destroy it leads us right down
directly on the road to barbarism.



 PATTY KIM:
 
 The U.S. House of Representatives has voted twice
to make all human cloning a crime. If the bill becomes law, anyone who defies
the ban could go to jail for up to 10 years and face a million dollar
fine.


 The measure is stalled in the Senate, but Senator Sam Brownback is trying
to change that.



 SAM BROWNBACK:
 
 The president is ready to sign a human cloning ban. We've
been blocked in the Senate. With the last election, we're going to revive
efforts to try to ban human cloning.



 PATTY KIM:
 
 President Bush supports some embryonic stem cell
research but only on a limited number of cell lines. He opposes cloning.



 GEORGE W. BUSH
 
 (President, United States of America)
 
 :
 
 We should
not, as a society, grow life to destroy it, and that's exactly what's taking
place.



 KEVIN EGGAN:
 
 I personally believe that the nuclear transfer embryos that
we create are, in a sense, not new life. I would argue that that embryo that's
growing in a dish, just like many other in vitro fertilization embryos, doesn't
actually have the potential to go on to become an individual unless it's
transferred into the uterus of a woman who's willing to carry it to term.



 SAM BROWNBACK:
 
 When does that human life's significance begin? We know
biologically it begins at conception. That's when your life began, that's when
my life began. If I kill you as an embryo you're not here today, if you kill me
as an embryo and research on me, I'm not here. So we know that,
biologically.



 PATTY KIM:
 
 When does a human become a human with all the legal
rights and protections of a person? Much of the debate comes down to this: a
human blastocyst, smaller than a grain of sand.


 Whether cloned or made from the union of egg and sperm, is it the same as a
person? What are its rights?



 SAM BROWNBACK:
 
 What is a human embryo? What is a human clone? Is it a
person or is it a piece of property? And most Americans look at this and they
say, "Life beings at conception." And if that's so, that, that life...there's a
sacredness to it, and we shouldn't be violating it.



 DOUG MELTON:
 
 Often times this issue is couched in terms of, "When does
life begin?" I think of it more as an issue, "When does a person begin?" And
personhood for me is a process. The fertilized egg has the potential to become
a person, but it won't necessarily become a person. Imagine you and I are
sitting in an IVF clinic with my son and the fire alarm goes off. So now I have
the choice of taking my son out of the room or grabbing a freezer with 100
fertilized eggs, which would I choose? I think for me that emphasizes the
difference between a real life, a person who exists, and a potential.



 PATTY KIM:
 
 Both the blastocyst and the child are alive. Some
scientists say we're approaching a crossroads where we, as a society, have to
choose. What life do we value more?


 Lauren's mom, Moira McCarthy Stanford, is a Catholic and the parent of a
diabetic child. Hopeful that the work might lead to a cure for diabetes, she
supports cloning for research.



 MOIRA McCARTHY STANFORD:
 
 To me, that ball of cells is the miracle of
possibility. It's the possibility of becoming a human being if it ends up
implanted in a woman. It's the possibility of becoming cells to be put in my
daughter because she needs to be cured of diabetes. It's the possibility of
becoming the nerve endings for
 

 a
 

 spinal cord so someone can walk
again. It hasn't made its mind up yet of what to be, and, therefore, it is the
possibility of all different kinds of life, whether it's new life or saving
life.



 ROBERT KRULWICH:
 
 That's Correspondent Patty Kim with
additional reporting by Deborah Amos.
</div>

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