Disgraced Scientist Gets Redemptive Discovery

Hwang Woo-Suk, the Korean scientist who gained international media attention for making fraudulent claims about cloning a human embryo, may have inadvertently made a significant breakthrough in stem cell research, a team of scientists led by a Harvard professor announced last week.

George Q. Daley, an associate professor at Harvard Medical school and a member of the Harvard Stem Cell Institute (HSCI) Faculty Executive Committee, led the team that studied Hwang’s research. They determined that Hwang produced human stem cells through parthenogenesis, a process whereby an unfertilized egg begins to divide through external stimulation.

HSCI Scientific Director David T. Scadden said that while the research was unable to discover Hwang’s methods from his falsified paper, the fact that parthenogenesis is possible in humans is still a major breakthrough.

“The reason this might be an important area for research,” Scadden said, “is that if you wanted to create a tissue for transplant, then you avoid the problem of rejection.”

Daley, who is currently out of the country, could not be reached for comment.

Scadden said that this area of study would be limited, however, both because it would only allow for stem cell lines from women and because it doesn’t allow scientists to create “disease-specific” stem cell lines.

“In terms of being useful as a replacement cell type, [parthenogenesis] can be advantageous,” he said. “But if you want to create cell lines that might be representative of all of the genetic components in someone who has a disease like ALS, for example, you need to do nuclear transfer.”

Scadden said that this process of somatic nuclear transfer—essentially taking a nucleus from a skin cell, transferring it into an egg, and then prompting the egg to divide—would allow scientists “to have in a petri dish a model of these complex diseases for which we have very little therapy.”

Somatic nuclear transfer is the process Hwang and his team claimed to have successfully performed in early 2004. Late the following year, Hwang’s research was discredited, as were other claims that he had cloned a dog. The disgraced scientist was also fired from his post at Seoul National University.

While those who object to stem cell research on moral grounds may be assuaged by the fact that parthenogenesis does not involve a fertilized egg, Scadden said that it would still likely face scrutiny.

Michael A. Fumento, a prominent conservative commentator on health and science issues, said he agreed that some people who were very religious might still see parthenogenesis as “tampering” with human life, but he said that eliminating the fertilized egg from the process might convince some that this stem cell research could be justified.

While Fumento said that he has been careful never to express an opinion on the morality of stem cell research in general, he said that he does take issue with the area of research that has received the most funding.

“Adult stem cells are so vastly superior that it is immoral to be taking funds from that research and putting it into embryonic stem cells,” he said.

Those “adult” stem cells are taken from the umbilical cord immediately after birth, and have been put forth by many embryonic stem cell opponents as a way to avoid destroying embryos.

Fumento added that even stem cell experts say that embryonic stem cell research may not yield clinic applications for many years.

But in a video clip on the Boston Children’s Hospital Web site, Daley said that each method of obtaining stem cells has its particular uses and that in some cases, embryonic stem cells may be the only viable option.

“If we want to treat...an individual with a specific genetic disease,” he said, “in that case having your own cells is always better.”

—Staff writer Nathan C. Strauss can be reached at strauss@fas.harvard.edu.