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Show Page C10 THE DAILY HERALD, Pr Monday, May 3, 1999 Whenwill yousay, ‘that’s enough?’ By BERNELL TAYLOR If you hadchildren attend. ing Columbine High School in Littleton, Colo., would you consider pulling themout of school? Ifa known pedophile was hanging out at yourchild's bus stop, would you still send them there? If your family was ethnic Albanian and you lived in southern Kosovo, would you be considering a relocation? In other words, how hot does the water need to yet hefore you decideto jump out of the pot? During the months of June and July, this column will dis cuss “when is enough enough?” and I'd like your input 1 would like to hear your feelings regarding any issuc you consideris getting out of hand and what you are doing, or propose to do about it only depicted in a movie. What about the workplace What about taxes? Where is your line of acceptance, and Scientists growing brains Researchers succeeding with various methods Mywife and [ have drawn a line regarding movie rat what do you plan to do ings beyond which we will not step. Even then, we occasionally get burned watching a movie within our when someone steps over it? With all the news about acceptance stan dard Where is your line? What alterna the Littleton tragedy, we recently tive forms asked one of our of daugh ters if enter tain ment she knewof do you employ when there is nothing anyone who might bring weapons to hut sex and vio lence on the silver school or per form an aet of violence that would threaten others, Without hest tation she responded “Hock Is there threa your child's school ereen? If you have an opinion on these mat crs or others, please join me in addr In the eves of most folks. | would be considered a very conservative kind of guy For example, if someone breaks one of the Ten Commandments in my pres: enee, will either challenge door, what will be on the other the action or makefor the door, Even if the offense were side im terms of good education: for your children? ing them When is enough enough for vou taki iny steps to reme dy the situation or find the door? And. if you choose the By DANIEL Q. H AP Medical Editor BOSTON Scientists want to fix the things that yo wrong inside your head, Their plan: Grow replacement parts for broken brains. They make it sound easy dust brew a batch of gray mat ter. Drill a hole in the skull, Put in the new stuff, Wire it up like the original Voila! New brains. cells that carrying dopamine correcting multiple scle undoing inherited metabolic disorders, maybe even rebuilding the wrecked brains of Alzheimer's disease victims. I mean not just putting in mitter or make alittle local con surprisingly close to reality Researchers can already do nection,” explains Dr. Jeffr Macklis of Children’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School in brains And as they so fondly and frequently point out, mice really are an awful lot like us. Some human experiments already hint at what's possible. Since the 1980s, doctors have cautiously tested) transferring brain cells from aborted fetuses to victims of Parkinson's dis short, they seem to work, “Mice brains are fundamentally not that different from hum ys Macklis. “The idea of using immature cells and guiding their differentiation to rebuild complex circuitry No, they havetheir sights on much more complicatedtargets. In the years to come, they see the possibility of rewiring brokenspines, patching upstrokes, Despite its whiff of madsci- cells to produce a neurotrans- with mouse other parts of the brain, In neurotransmitter entist run amok, this scenario is amazing things missing, They connect up with make the message- Boston. “I mean really rewiring complex circuitry in the brain Ten years ago, this would have been considered totally Five years ago, it would he ve been a little bonkers.” Macklis goes on to talk about his mice, thecritters of choice for those who study such things. is no longer eri Until recently, human fetuses were the only sourceof brain material for such jobs, but they were never ideal. Doctors’ qualms go beyond the ethical thickets of recycling aborted material. Fetuses will always be in short supply; it takes several to treat just one patient. And quality is hard to control, especially considering that many wereaborted for a reason, such as genetic abnormalities. But now scient seem certain that transplanting brain material what theycall cell rapy is about to become practical. The reasonis the dis'yofentirely newreservoirs of brain material, At dozens of you? When will you pack up case, For some,it seems to work When immature cells are trans: your bag remarkably well, restoring lost control of movement But to those on the cusp of this new technology Parkinson's is almost too casy across the animals’ tiny they are developing three main aged brains. They take root in just the spots where they are cerous growths and the tissue exact brands of cells that One ofthese sources can be found at a gleaming biomedical ’ And then what? Lets talk about it Address comments to sernell Taylor, PO, Box 370 Springeile. UT S668oF It involves the death of just one in small bit of material, the bri Bernell-JuievGraphies planted under precisely the right: conditions, thi needed. They morph into the universities and biotech firms, varieties — animal brains, can- wellspring called stemcells. lab off a country road about 60 miles west of Boston. Thefirst thing that makes theplace seema little odd is the technicians’ get-ups: green surgical scrubs with knee-high black rubber boots. Then there's the smell. Despite fans that turn over SSSSsrry eaat il the air 19 times an hourand filter it cleaner than an operating room’s, thelab carries a certain barnyard redolence, an unmis- takable eau de pig. This labis also a barn, hometo 65 or so grunting, rooting animals. But the end product is brain parts, not pork chops. “This is literally the cleanest pig facility on the face of the earth, David Boucher, the veterinary technician who makes sure the walls sparkle, the germs stay far awayand the animals themselves unpiglikespotlessness. enjoy So far, thepig cells have been tested on 20 people with Parkinson's, six with epiley sy there's a Wall, that can build you a g reat Website and lead and six with Huntington's di: ease. Ofthefirst 11 Parkinson's patients treated, three improvedsignificantly. have no doubt this can work and produce tremendous benefit, Dr. Greg Stewart of Genzyme, which is developing the treatment with Diacrin, anotherbiotech firm Whilethe supplyoffetal pig cells is not a problem, there are other drawbacks. Patients may need to take immune-suppre ing drugs to keep their bodie from rejecting the tissue, and there is a remote chance that dangerous animal viru might be passedalong. “[ don't think it’s an elegant way to solve the problem; Dr. Michael Levesque of Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. A bit moreelegant, perhaps is a methodbeing tested at the y of Pittsburgh, there are experimentaltransplanting humancells ly into the brains of stroke vietims. Thecells aresimilar to stem cells, the factories that manufacture various kinds oftissue inside the body, But there’s a First, you find someoneto build your Website. Thenyoufind someoneto host it, Then you find a wayfor customers to find you site. Or you can make one phone ca, ndlet one company doit all US WESTDex’ We'll create your Web n help you find the right ways oe CrReaeS Ueee uel eeeea ecckuy Tenaae Call 1-800-369-2521 catch: These cells began as cancer, grown in test tubes from a’ to drive local customers to it. With powerful Internet tools like links from the Dex Internet Yellow Pages and local bannerads. Call U S WESTDextoday, We've beenbringing buyers andsellers together for over a century. Now we'll show you how todo it in the next century. uswestdex.com year-old’s testicular tumor. The transplants are being tested on 12 stroke victims suffer para! or other serious disability, even though the strokes destroyed only a small bit oftheir braintissue. Three Dexk Yellow Pages * White: Pages * Web Site » WebSite Link * E-mail Link » Local Banner Ads to have third has better control of arm and wees seem improved. One walks better, another is less stiff, while a leg movements. Are the extra cells responsible? Or is this the natural course of recov- ery? Dr. Douglas Kondziolka, the surgeon in charge, does not know, Still, he says, “We were hopingfor a glimmerofefficacy so we could continue on. We've seen even alittle more than a’ glimmer.” " |