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On November 20, 2007, it was announced that a major breakthrough had occurred almost simultaneously on two continents, with respect to stem-cell research. It looks as though, in years to come, thousands of labs will have the capability to reprogram skin cells to function in much the same way as embryonic stem cells.

Two research groups have found different genetic recipes to give ordinary skin cells the power to turn into virtually any kind of human tissue, just as embryonic stem cells do.

"If the recipes live up to their promise, they could someday end the [pseudo-]ethical debate over embryonic stem cell research — and usher in an era when a person's own cells could be manipulated to mend a broken spinal cord, heal a damaged heart or regenerate other failing tissues.

"But in their current state, the recipes are too risky for disease treatment, and even the scientists behind the latest studies cautioned that therapies are still years away. In announcing their discoveries, they emphasized that much more research still needs to be done on stem cells that have been derived from human embryos."

"'It's not the time to say human embryonic stem cell research is dead,' James Thomson, a biologist at the Univerity of Wisconsin at Madison, who is behind a study appearing in the journal Science, told msnbc.com.

"Kyoto University's Shinya Yamanaka, the principal author of a study published by the journal Cell, echoed that view, saying it would be "premature" to conclude that the cells created in his lab could replace embryonic stem cells.

"Like embryonic stem cells, these reprogrammed cells become 'pluripotent' — that is, they're capable of turning themselves into virtually any tissue type in the human body, including neurons and heart tissue. They also exhibit many of the other biochemical properties of embryonic stem cells, although they're not genetically identical to stem cells. [Emphasis mine, wherever colored type, italics, or boldfacing appear, within quoted statements in this article. No verbiage was changed in those.]"

"That bright future depends on a series of big ifs.

"First of all, the function of the reprogrammed cells will have to be compared closely with the function of actual embryonic stem cells. "I'd be surprised if these cells do all the same tricks as stem cells derived from embryos," Advanced Cell Technology's chief scientific officer, Robert Lanza told msnbc.com.

"Also, in both experiments, the four-gene recipe was added to the skin cells using a virus as the delivery package. "The FDA [Food and Drug Administration] would never allow us to use these virus-modified cells in patients," Lanza said."

A back door to human cloning? Yamanaka also said the reprogramming technique could allow for the creation of egg cells as well as sperm cells from the same person, male or female.

This Breakthrough is NOT a Substitute for ongoing Ebryonic Stem-Cell Research