The Independent reports today that present is “hope for millions of Alzheimer’s sufferers as scientists make brain cells from human skin”. It said that “scientists had manage to change a person's skin tissue into functioning nerve cells – bypassing an in-between stem-cell stage – by the relatively simple procedure of adding a few small strands of RNA, a genetic molecule similar to DNA”.
This is an interesting study which builds on earlier research in this area. It may enable scientists to study the behaviour of neurons (brain cells) more without difficulty in the future. Eventually, this might lead to the development and difficult of treatments for brain diseases in the laboratory.
However, this research is at rest in the early stages. Any application to the avoidance or treatment of brain sickness such as Alzheimer’s in humans is unclear. Whether converted neurons grown in the laboratory can still be used to replace diseased or abnormal cells in living human brains will need considerably extra research.
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