South Korean Research Team Increases The Success Rate Of Developing Healthy Embryonic Stem Cells To 7 Percent
A South Korean research team from CHA University Stem Cell Institute has successfully increased the success rate of developing a healthy embryonic stem cell, reported Korea JoongAng Daily Oct. 30.
The team noted on Thursday that they were able to reproduce an adult cell in which they integrated eggs.
In 2014, the team was able to create for the first time a healthy embryonic stem cell line from a regular adult cell, with a success rate of only one to two percent. This hindered the research team from producing cell treatment medications intended for patients suffering from chronic or even incurable diseases.
The latest research done by the team was a joint effort with Professor Yi Zhang of the Harvard University Medical School and Professor Chung Young Gie of the Sung Kwang Medical Foundation in Los Angeles. Their collaboration has increased the success rate of producing healthy embryonic stem cells to seven percent after identifying which genetic enzyme was responsible for the development of healthy stem cells.
"More enhanced technology this time will offer much wider access to patients, by making stem cell creation easier with lower quality eggs - even those leftover eggs after in vitro procedures," said co-author of the study and head of the CHA research team, Lee Dong Ryul. "If the technology gets implemented ... patients will be the largest beneficiary as this biomedicine can treat diseases without immunosuppressant drugs."
The progress in the study conducted by the South Korean team of researchers gives hope to those depending on embryonic stem cell for advancements in medication for life-threatening diseases following the embryonic stem cell scandal of 2005.
The National Center for Biotechnology Information reported in 2006 that a research team led by Seoul University investigator Woo Suk Hwang were involved in a fraudulent embryonic stem cell research scandal.
The 2005 study claimed that the researchers were able to establish 11 embryonic stem cell lines with nuclear DNA from their subjects' somatic cells, a breakthrough that would have paved the way to therapeutic cloning for human embryonic stem cell research.
However, after a co-author claimed that Hwang admitted to falsifying the evidences for nine of the 11 cell lines, a committee from Seoul University started investigating on Hwang's research and found that all the 11 cell lines did not match the DNAs of its corresponding somatic cell donors.