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Stem Cell Research: The Benefits of Stem Cells Essay

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In Brazil 2009, there was an 18 year old boy that had half of his jaw and teeth removed because of a tumor. Scientists took some of his bone marrow and extracted the adult stem cells from it and formed an osteoblast, which is a bone forming cell. Six months after the osteoblast was injected, it started forming new bone material which filled the gaps (NIH Stem Cells). Stem cells could be a genius way to treat many diseases and disorders and it should be supported by everyone.
Stem cells get their name from the fact that they are basic cells that other cells develop from. They are capable of developing into a wide range of cells. Stem cells could potentially be used to grow new cells to replace the cells that were destroyed or damaged by …show more content…

Scientists need to know that all the stem cells completely change into the tissue to avoid negative side effects, like tumors, when the cells are implanted in patients. Scientists also try to experimentally treat diseases with no cure with stem cells by implanting them into animal models, like mice (Freedman 13). Many different groups of people protest stem cell research. Some protesters say that getting stem cells from embryos amounts to killing a person to improve the life of another (Freedman 18). People protest stem cell research even though the embryos and fetuses would be discarded anyway (Freedman 19). They think if it is accepted, they will start experimenting on people who are going to die, like death row inmates and terminally ill people (Freedman 22). Some supporters of stem cell research say that using tissue from dead embryos is equivalent to transplanting organs from people that died from homicide or suicide. They say stem cell experiments in animals have already shown improvements in disorders. Treatments for diseases and disorders can’t be developed if experiments aren’t performed. There are a lot of potential uses of stem cells, but there are obstacles that we need to go through first. Stem cells can be used to test new drugs that scientists make. We could generate healthy heart muscle cells with stem cells. Injected cells could repair things in the body by secreting growth factors. Before scientists start

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