Stem-cell discovery a global media force

When a scientific advance is hailed as “the biological equivalent of the Wright Brothers’ first airplane,” it stands to reason that the work will grab worldwide attention.

Still, the news coverage generated by the latest stem cell discovery from the lab of James Thomson has a level of depth, breadth and longevity rarely seen with scientific advances. While the achievement — reprogramming skin cells to essentially become blank-slate stem cells — is a monument of biology, the news story itself reprogrammed in many different dimensions: the science behind the discovery, the ethical implications, the national and state political and budget issues, and the business and patent implications.

A search on Google News several days after the work was published in the journal Science produced more than 900 individual stories, including front-page pieces in the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal and USA Today. More than 500 national broadcast news affiliates covered the advance. And the work continues to generate scores of editorials and commentary.

The Philadelphia Inquirer, for example, thanked the scientists for continued progress amid “distasteful and unnecessary” political grandstanding. “Thanks to their labors, the human world is enjoying a golden age, learning so many new things it will take generations to understand how miraculous this moment really is. We, too, contain a universe of possible futures.”

The Baltimore Sun editorialized caution about declaring an end to the stem cell debate. “As their work and that of colleagues around the world goes on, study must continue as well on embryonic stem cells, for its own sake and because knowledge gained from one field of study informs the other.”

Thomson also stressed the need for keeping all lines of inquiry open in stem cell research. In a Washington Post column co-written with American Association for the Advancement of Science Chief Executive Alan Leshner, Thomson called for easing federal restrictions on embryonic stem cell research.

“Discomfort with the notion of extracting stem cells from embryos is understandable,“ they wrote. “But many of the life-changing medical advances of recent history, including heart transplantation, have provoked discomfort. Struggling with bioethical questions remains a critical step in any scientific advancement.”