STEM cell researchers around the world are facing the nightmare possibility that their experiments have been messed up by contamination from animal cells. The contaminant is an animal sugar already known to find its way into cultures of ordinary human cells. It has now been found in a Bush-approved stem cell line, and leads to rejection of the stem cells by the human immune system.
This means the cells cannot be used in therapies and also calls into question all scientific work carried out using the cells. “If you were seeing a phenomenon in a dish, you need to ask…
