The news coming out of the prestigious Moorfields Eye Hospital in London has been heartening for anyone suffering from vision problems. With an ageing population, that will include just about everybody over time. The radical use of retinal stem cells to cure macular degeneration and other irreversible eye diseases has shown promising results and this was recently reported in the world press and media to much acclaim and fanfare and rightly so.
It so happens that I was once referred to Moorfields (while I was living and teaching in London from 2002-2005) for possible eye surgery although I eventually opted for such treatment here at home in Australia. The Bionic eye is gaining in sophistication and effectiveness and has also undergone successful trials here and overseas.
Blindness is a scourge in under developed countries and here at home particularly impacts on Australia’s Aboriginal communities. Sometimes even cheap and easy procedures can save a person’s sight and anyone who has seen the Sir Fred Hollows foundation infomercials is aware of this.
Along with the rapid development of the bionic eye by several competing medical research teams around the world (most prominently in the US, the UK and Australia) there is tangible hope that blindness as we know it will be scaled back markedly if not banished altogether. Stem cell research promises to open up new vistas in all areas of medicine and the retinal stem cell trials are an important step along that path.
Wednesday, February 8, 2012
Days of futures past
Sometimes, like old friends and lovers that didn’t quite work out, life can have unintended or unforeseen consequences. Take the universal field of science and technology; what can seem to be a harbinger for future prosperity and happiness can be anything but.
Nuclear Fusion power was supposed to be generating electricity from ocean water at rates too cheap to meter yet even after decades of intense, global research a commercial reactor is still probably a century or more away. Putting “the sun in a box” as one frustrated scientist put it, is much easier said than done.
Fission power, which has shown much more than promise, has given several developed nations commercially viable power but at what cost? The ongoing problem with Iran’s program illustrates the point that reactors can also create weapons grade plutonium. Added to that is the vexing issue of the disposal of nuclear waste and you can see why Germany recently decided to scrap its entire program. The catastrophe at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear reactors following the devastating earthquake and tsunami indicates many of the world’s 500 or so reactors are in need of an upgrade (with respect to safety measures at least) or even replacement. Only China is producing nuclear power reactors in numbers and their record for safety is spotty at best. Some like the inventor of Gaia theory James Lovelock look to nuclear power as a solution to global warming but I and many others are not so sure following the Fukushima fallout and blowback.
In the area of medical science stem cell research was hailed as a miracle cure for any number of ailments pertaining to every organ inside and outside (from the heart, lungs and brain to the skin and everything in between) the body. Like gene therapy it was and is seen as cutting edge and something within reach in real time. Gene therapy had a few false starts (ending in some cases in the death of the patient) and the medical science researchers and doctors have gone back to the drawing board so to speak. Stem cell treatment was also advertised as being just around the corner yet the truth was and is far different. Progress has been steady and welcome but there is a long way to go before a new heart or even brain is created to order around protein scaffolding. I have no doubts it shall eventually happen as advertised by promoters inside and outside the medical profession. The good news is that doctors and medical scientists at London’s renowned Moorfields Eye Hospital have achieved positive results following a trial of retinal stem cell treatment on several patients with seriously deteriorating vision leading to blindness.
The future is not always all it’s cracked up to be, just ask technocrats from the former Soviet Union. So while we are still not flying around in jet packs or taking vacations to the moon, science is progressing, only not exactly at the rate we would like. Advances in silicon chip design and electronics (and the large screen HD TV, the iPhone and iPad would be impossible without it) in general indicate that astounding progress can and will be made although just what areas of science and technology this is made in and at what rate is something beyond predictive analysis. I do believe in science and while we might not have fusion reactors or manned missions to Mars in my lifetime much that is good and useful will come to pass even as we speak.
Nuclear Fusion power was supposed to be generating electricity from ocean water at rates too cheap to meter yet even after decades of intense, global research a commercial reactor is still probably a century or more away. Putting “the sun in a box” as one frustrated scientist put it, is much easier said than done.
Fission power, which has shown much more than promise, has given several developed nations commercially viable power but at what cost? The ongoing problem with Iran’s program illustrates the point that reactors can also create weapons grade plutonium. Added to that is the vexing issue of the disposal of nuclear waste and you can see why Germany recently decided to scrap its entire program. The catastrophe at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear reactors following the devastating earthquake and tsunami indicates many of the world’s 500 or so reactors are in need of an upgrade (with respect to safety measures at least) or even replacement. Only China is producing nuclear power reactors in numbers and their record for safety is spotty at best. Some like the inventor of Gaia theory James Lovelock look to nuclear power as a solution to global warming but I and many others are not so sure following the Fukushima fallout and blowback.
In the area of medical science stem cell research was hailed as a miracle cure for any number of ailments pertaining to every organ inside and outside (from the heart, lungs and brain to the skin and everything in between) the body. Like gene therapy it was and is seen as cutting edge and something within reach in real time. Gene therapy had a few false starts (ending in some cases in the death of the patient) and the medical science researchers and doctors have gone back to the drawing board so to speak. Stem cell treatment was also advertised as being just around the corner yet the truth was and is far different. Progress has been steady and welcome but there is a long way to go before a new heart or even brain is created to order around protein scaffolding. I have no doubts it shall eventually happen as advertised by promoters inside and outside the medical profession. The good news is that doctors and medical scientists at London’s renowned Moorfields Eye Hospital have achieved positive results following a trial of retinal stem cell treatment on several patients with seriously deteriorating vision leading to blindness.
The future is not always all it’s cracked up to be, just ask technocrats from the former Soviet Union. So while we are still not flying around in jet packs or taking vacations to the moon, science is progressing, only not exactly at the rate we would like. Advances in silicon chip design and electronics (and the large screen HD TV, the iPhone and iPad would be impossible without it) in general indicate that astounding progress can and will be made although just what areas of science and technology this is made in and at what rate is something beyond predictive analysis. I do believe in science and while we might not have fusion reactors or manned missions to Mars in my lifetime much that is good and useful will come to pass even as we speak.
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