Will Knox Period 1 Mr. Castello Controversial Essay Stem cells are unlike any other cells in the human body. They have the remarkable ability to become many different cell types in the body during the early stages of life and growth. Stem cells also serve as sort of an internal repair system, they can divide without limit creating a mass amount of one cell if needed. When a stem cell divides its offspring has two paths it can take. It can either remain a stem cell and be unspecialized or they can become another type of cell with a specific job such as heart cell or brain cells. Stem cells are different from all other cells because of two characteristics. These cells are unspecialized meaning they have no specific job in the body and they can renew themselves through cell division. Second, stem cells can be induced to become tissue or organ specific cells with certain jobs they must carry out. In some …show more content…
I think that they destruction of embryos should not be allowed even if the potential benefit is great because you are talking about killing life. You are terminating a life in order to restore a life. If that is the only reliable way of getting stem cells then the benefit is not worth the loss. In 2006 scientist were able to extract embryonic stem cells from mice without destroying the embryo. This was one of the major breakthroughs that allows scientist to research stem cells. I think that if scientist could find a way to perfect this way of extracting stem cells then these cells could replace organ donation in the future. In fact I would bet that in the next 20 years stem cells will be healing burn wounds, curing parkinson's disease and reversing the damage from a heart attack on a daily basis. This is a much faster way than organ donation and will also be a more reliable way. Stem cells are the future of health, medicine and life in the