The British scientist that created Dolly the sheep, is to head a new centre commissioned to use stem cell research to develop treatments for various human diseases.

|PIC1|Professor Ian Wilmut has been officially announced as the Director of Edinburgh University’s new Centre for Regenerative Medicine. The report comes just days after the British government stated that it would increase funding to stem cell research by £50 million over the next two years.

The centre is hoped to be a new focal-point for ground-breaking research in the UK and across the globe, stated Professor Wilmut, and it will be based at the site of Edinburgh’s Royal Infirmary at Little France.

The scientist commented, “This centre will provide a unique environment for world-class research with stem cells with the aim of developing therapies for diseases which in many cases do not have any treatment at the present time.”

Backing the announcement, the university’s head of medicine and veterinary medicine, Professor John Savill explained that he also had expectations that the centre would become a magnet for medical expertise.

Savill said, “We want to draw the very best young clinical and basic scientists from around the world to Scotland to work with our NHS partners and develop new approaches towards prevention and treatment of debilitating diseases affecting the nervous system, liver and other key organs.”

|TOP|Controversial in the news over the past few years, stem cells have been hailed by scientists due to their ability to grow indefinitely, thereby producing “daughter cells” that can form various different tissue matter.

Scientists have reported that the cells could lead to the discovery of new drugs which may be able to prevent inheritable diseases.

Last week Britain announced that it is to double its spending on stem cell research to £100 million over the next two years. The controversial drive has been declared in response to calls for an increase in funding for Britain to retain its position as one of the leading regions in the controversial research.

South Korea, China and Singapore have all put stem cell research as a top priority, and the US has been known to have invested large amounts of money despite federal restrictions on embryonic stem cell work. California alone is planning to spend US$3 billion over 10 years.

|AD|Stem cells are master cells in the body that can develop into any cell type, and scientists believe they could therefore act as a type of repair system for the body.

But their use is controversial because the most promising stem cells for treating human diseases are derived from very early human embryos left over from fertility treatments.

The controversy over the use of human embryos in stem cell research first sparked in summer 2004 when the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) in Britain issued the first license in Europe for therapeutic cloning. The license legally enabled a group of scientists from the Newcastle University to clone a human embryo with desired genetics and to yield the stem cells from the embryo for medical research.

The evangelical Christian charity CARE commented on stem cell research in a statement, saying "It will make and then kill an embryo as a source of spare parts for the use of others. This research cheapens human life."

Maria Böhmer, deputy chair of Germany's conservative opposition, the Christian Democratic Union, also warned that in such kind of cloning and research, "the human being is degraded to a material."

She called Britain's decision as "an extremely alarming and disastrous development for Europe."

In Europe, countries are deeply divided in their opinions on therapeutic cloning and stem cell research. England and Belgium have been shown to be the most liberal, having granted licenses to clone human embryos as a source of stem cells. Switzerland appears to stand in line with the Netherlands, France, Denmark and Spain, allowing research on embryos left over from artificial reproduction.