Korean animal researcher clones human stem cells, from ANIMAL PEOPLE, June 2005

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, June 2005:

 

 

Korean animal researcher clones human stem cells

 

SEOUL-- " I never destroy any life during my process, " Seoul

National University stem cell research laboratory director Woo Suk

Hwang recently told New York Times correspondent James Brooke.

Woo Suk Hwang on May 20, 2005 announced that he had become

the first scientist to successfully clone human stem cells-- " a major

leap, " wrote Brooke, " toward the dream of growing replacement

tissues for conditions like spinal cord injuries, juvenile diabetes,

and congenital immune deficiencies. "

Said Woo Suk Hwang, " We use only a vacant [unfertilized]

egg, with no genetic materials " from which to form an embryo.

Trained as a veterinarian, Woo Suk Hwang, 52, was raised

by a widowed mother who supported six children as a dairy hand.

" I could communicate with cows eye to eye, " Woo Suk Hwang told Brooke.

Woo Suk Hwang is a devout practicing Buddhist, wrote Apoorva

Mandavilli in a profile for the journal Nature Medicine.

But in conversing with Brooke, Woo Suk Hwang appeared to

refer only to never destroying any human life. His past achievements

have included producing the first cow conceived in South Korea

through in vitro fertilization in 1993; the first South Korean

cloned cow in 1999; the first South Korean cloned pigs in 2002; and

the first cows genetically engineered to resist mad cow disease, in

2003.

Most of this, perhaps all, could have been done without

loss of life beyond the embryonic stage, but Woo Suk Hwang has plans

that almost certainly involve severely injuring and eventually

killing laboratory animals.

" This year, " wrote Brooke, " he hopes to use animal stem

cells to treat spinal cord injuries in rats, dogs, and possibly

monkeys. If the animal trials go well, he hopes to apply for

permission in South Korea and the U.S. to start conducting human

trials in two to three years. "

Finding adequate specimens without deliberately injuring

animals would be unlikely.

But Woo Suk Hwang would have to replace 99 monkeys after an

April 20 power transformer fire at the Korea Research Institute of

Bioscience & Biotechnology in Daejeon, the only primate laboratory

in South Korea.

The fire caused a two-hour electrical blackout. The 135

monkeys housed at the lab overheated. " Power from a backup source

was supplied immediately, but the fire somehow broke the temperature

control device, " lab publicity manager Kim Yeong-gwon told the

Joongang Daily.

" We found more than half of the monkeys dead, " primate

research center chief Hyun Byung-hwa said.

Three days after the fire, the Korea Times disclosed that

Woo Suk Hwang and team had " discovered ways to prevent monkeys

rejecting organ transplants from pigs, paving the way for the use of

animal organs and cells in humans, " Agence France-Presse summarized.

The Korea Times quoted a research team member as stating that

they had produced " dozens of pigs embedded with human immunity genes

since late last year. "

Hwang had intended to begin trying to transplant hearts and

insulin-producing cells from cloned miniature pigs into monkeys in

June 2005, but that phase of the work was delayed by the laboratory

fire, the Korea Times reported.

Seoul National University and other South Korean labs have

emerged as world leaders in biotech not just because they have

talented scientists, but also because they can work inexpensively

with minimal regulatory restraint.

Woo Suk Hwang and the 45 researchers and technicians employed in his

lab operate on a total budget of just $2 million per year, Brooke

wrote.

In view of the economic promise of Woo Suk Hwang's

experiments, the South Korean government has announced plans to

increase the lab budget by 50% and to build a six-story $25 million

headquarters for stem cell research.

A similar facility under construction by Oxford University in

England is to cost $32 million--if there are no further cost overruns

as result of a series of delays associated with anti-vivisection

protests. The work was suspended entirely throughout the latter half

of 2004.

Opposition to animal use in biomedical research is not

unknown in South Korea, but the South Korean antivivisection

movement is small, orderly, and still seeking basic animal welfare

regulations that have been in effect in Britain, the U.S., and much

of western Europe for decades.

Currently, South Korean government supervision of animal use

is mostly limited to maintaining biosecurity, so as to avoid

spreading disease.

Several prominent South Korean biomedical researchers aligned

themselves with the dog meat industry in a November 2001 public

statement, timed to forestall the introduction of broadly applicable

animal welfare legislation that animal advocates had hoped might be

introduced in response to the threat of a boycott of the 2002 World

Cup soccer tournament. The 2002 World Cup matches were divided

between South Korea and Japan.

 

--Merritt Clifton

Editor, ANIMAL PEOPLE

P.O. Box 960

Clinton, WA 98236

Telephone: 360-579-2505

Fax: 360-579-2575

E-mail: anmlpepl

Web: www.animalpeoplenews.org

 

 

--

Kim Bartlett, Publisher of ANIMAL PEOPLE Newspaper

Postal mailing address: P.O. Box 960, Clinton WA 98236 U.S.A.

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