Pittsburgh Post-Gazette - University of Pittsburgh researchers have discovered that one type of cell in the human placenta has characteristics that are strikingly similar to embryonic stem cells in their ability to regenerate a wide variety of tissues.

The cells, called amniotic epithelial cells, potentially could be used to produce new liver cells to treat liver failure, or new pancreatic islet cells to cure diabetes or new neurons to treat Parkinson's disease.

Unlike embryonic stem cells, which are obtained only by destroying human embryos, these cells can be extracted from the same placentas that now are routinely discarded after birth. They thus could be a non-controversial alternative to embryonic stem cells.

"We think it would be easier to get these to the clinic than [embryonic stem] cells," said Stephen Strom, an associate professor of pathology at the Pitt medical school.

I don't think you will find too much opposition to this one. My wife has given birth twice now and I've seen this weird placenta thing. It's black and about the size of a baseball, or so, in case you were curious. Additionally, in case you wanted to know more, the placenta is basically an organ that forms during pregnancy to nourish, protect, and support all functions of a growing "fetus." It's really an amazing organ. In some old cultures, they used to cook the thing and include it in a big feast every time a baby was born. Sounds gross, but the thing is so rich and good for you it's actually not a bad idea (not that I'd ever want to do it, now that I've seen one "birthed".. yuck!)

Anyway, to the topic at hand, I think this is great news and maybe will help shift the debate slightly away from harvesting babies tissue and trying this first to see if we can get anywhere with this research. Along with adult stem cells, we can at least figure out what we're doing with this whole stem-cell research deal on non-embryonic strings and we'll leave the debate for when there is some real potential in those strings, k?