Category Archives: Alabama Stem Cells

How far should scientists be allowed to go in creating things that resemble primitive human brains, hearts, and even human embryos?

That's the question being asked by a group of Harvard scientists who are doing exactly that in their labs. They're using stem cells, genetics and other new biological engineering techniques to create tissues, primitive organs and other living structures that mimic parts of the human body.

Their concern is that they and others doing this type of "synthetic biology" research might be treading into disturbing territory.

"We don't know where this going to go," says John Aach, a lecturer in genetics at Harvard Medical School. "This is just the beginning of this field."

Aach helped write a paper in the journal eLife, published Tuesday, calling for an international effort to establish guidelines for this provocative area of research.

While all this may sound like something out of Frankenstein, the goal is to find new ways to decipher the mysteries of human biology and to discover novel treatments for health problems ranging from infertility to aging.

"We want to understand biology of natural human development and disease and come up with ways of addressing the problems of disease," Aach says. "The more precisely you can make something that is like a tissue or a system of tissues in a dish, the easier it is to experiment on it."

But in the process of conducting their experiments, Aach and his lab colleagues realized scientists might cross disturbing ethical lines.

For example, scientists could create primitive beating hearts and primordial brains.

"How much moral concern should we have for these things? If it has a brain that doesn't look like a human brain, but it operates like one, it could still feel pain," Aach says.

Some scientists have already started creating entities that resemble the very early stages of human embryos. Scientists use different names to describe them. They're sometimes called "embryoids," but Aach's group has dubbed them "SHEEFs" synthetic human entities with embryo-like features.

In some of these experiments, researchers have seen early signs of the formation of the "primitive streak," which is the beginning of a central nervous system and, potentially, the ability to sense pain.

That work raises the prospect that the experiments might violate the 14-day rule, which has been in place for decades to avoid raising too many ethical concerns about experimenting on human embryos. Two weeks into embryonic development is usually when the primitive streak begins to appear.

But Aach and his colleagues argue that the 14-day rule, which is a guideline in the United States and law in some other countries, has become outdated by this latest generation of experiments.

It's based on the predictable, linear development of a normal human embryo. But the new synthetic biology techniques do not necessarily follow that road map.

"The primitive streak was like a stop sign," Aach says. "If you stopped there you would never get a brain. You would never get a heart. You would never get something that would be morally concerning."

"But now with these tissue engineering and stem cell techniques you can simply go around that," Aach says. "You could create something at a point beyond that. It might become sentient."

It's also possible that some day these embryoids could become so much like a normal human embryo that they could actually be used to create a baby.

So, in essence, "you've gone off-road," Aach says. "With these synthetic tissues there's no longer one highway of development. A stop sign is no longer good enough."

The ethical concerns are not just limited to structures that resemble embryos, Aach says.

As a result, he and the co-authors of the report say new guidelines are needed to replace that clear stop sign with something that's more like a guardrail or fence that will keep scientists from inadvertently steering into ethically troubling terrain.

"What we're proposing is, instead of doing stop signs, we get these perimeter fences where there's an agreement that there's an area of concern," Aach says.

For example, scientists, philosophers, bioethicists and others may reach a consensus that "we can't make a brain that will allow it to feel pain" or "we can't make something like a heart but we can make up to it," Aach says, "as long as it doesn't start beating."

Others scientists praised the researchers for raising these tough issues early.

"I absolutely support this," Magdelena Zernicka-Goetz tells Shots in an email; she is doing similar research at the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom. "The time is right to begin discussion of these issues in a forum that includes scientists and has a wide representation of society," Zernicka-Goetz says.

Some bioethicists also welcomed a debate about these issues.

"I really have to give them credit for raises these issues proactively," says Insoo Hyun, a Case Western Reserve University bioethicist. "Our current standards for oversight and ethics are not adequate to capture this new area of science."

But it could be difficult to draw the line in some cases, Hyun notes, such as in experiments aimed at developing treatments for pain or those aiming to understanding the heart better.

"Those types of experiments may be exactly the point of why you'd want to create a synthetic entity that does have some kind of pain sensation, or that has some sort of neural network, or has some sort of heart beat, if that's actually the body system you want to study," Hyun says.

And, he says, there may be some experiments people find disturbing on a visceral level.

"Some people may just find that the experiments are just kind of creepy," Hyun says. "There may be some people concerned about scientists taking the research too far, creating entities in the dish that are quasi-human and [that they] de-value life in the process."

Ali Brivanlou, an embryologist at the Rockefeller University who is conducting some of the most advanced work in this area, also says he welcomes a debate. But worried about putting too many limitations on the research.

"We have to dive into this carefully, but I think we really need to move forward," he tells Shots. "I think it's important that we don't somehow let religion or political conviction be a guiding force in this argument. The truth has to come from science."

Originally posted here:
Harvard Scientists Call For Better Rules To Guide Research On 'Embryoids' - Alabama Public Radio

West was part of a team a few years ago at Kansas State University that used maggots. The maggots ate the dead flesh out of a horse's hoof. With that and stem cells and surgery, they saved a severely lame mare from euthanasia.

And then there's West River's other veterinarian from the millennial generationJenna Innes, 31, who has been practicing at West River for about two years.

Innes recalled examining an extremely thin dog that couldn't put on weight. Its owner told Innes they had tried to find help elsewhere but the problem hadn't been successfully diagnosed and making it worse, people, suspecting the owner of animal neglect, had even reported the situation to authorities.

It was Innes who was able to figure out what was wrong an odd pancreatic disorder and successfully treated it. The dog is now teetering on being too pudgy, Innes said.

Innes and West, the clinic's two newest and youngest vets, "bring youth and energy, new technologies and information," said Dr. Ethan Andress, who has practiced at the clinic for about 17 years.

"They are two very talented veterinarians that have an energy and passion for what they do...the next generation to take over the clinic," Andress said.

In addition, they and the clinic's other three vets get to practice in a new state-of-the-art facility with such equipment as a digital x-ray machine and in-house blood machines that give immediate results for most tests.

An open house to celebrate the clinic's one-year anniversary is set for April 21.

The new clinic, at 203 Highway 12 E., is located across town from the old clinic, which is now being used for boarding and storage, West said.

West, whose strongest interest is equine medicine, said the clinic is seeing a doubling in recent years on time spent providing equine services.

West also has started Ferrier Days at the clinic bringing in ferrier Casey Kalenze from Bowman to provide services. While there, horses can also get other services deworming, vaccinations, exams.

"It's a convenience, saves (the horse owners) mileage," West said.

She's also considering adding alternative treatments such as acupuncture and chiropractic help.

Innes, who grew up on a sheep and cattle ranch, has a general practice, but because of her background has become the go-to vet for the clinic's sheep and goat clients.

"I get phone calls from all across the state," she said.

Innes, who grew up in Wyoming on the family ranch, said her family knew tough times.

"We were pretty broke," said Innes, who was age 12 when her dad died.

So she said she knows how hard it is sometimes financially to call a vet in to help.

The West River veterinarians say they are aware that many pet owners and livestock producers have a limited budget.

"We do as much as we can...We can come up with creative solutions," West said. "We can do a lot of good even within a limited budget.

Innes said she knows personally the impact of one sick animal: "I remember how much that one cow can affect the family. That's a person's livelihood."

Innes said she wanted to be a veterinarian from the moment she knew what the word meant.

"I always wanted to save animals...I always wished I could help," Innes said.

She said she remembers regularly bringing homeless animals home and caring for them, sometimes in secret locations, unbeknownst to the family.

"My parents kind of got used to it," she said.

Innes, a graduate of Auburn University's vet school in Alabama, said she made it through the extremely rigorous program not because she's a genius, but because, "I'm a really hard worker."

She said she kind of lives by something she read once: "If you're lucky enough to find a way of life you love, you have to find the courage to live it."

Innes, who wanted to come back close to home to practice, convinced a vet at West River to be her preceptor for her vet school's required two-month work clinic she had to complete.

The clinic would end up offering her a position.

Now she cares for everything from sheep, goats, cattle, dogs, to sugar gliders and ferrets. She once had to break the news to someone who thought they had bought two male guinea pigs that the one getting "fat" was definitely not male.

West grew up in Menoken in a rodeo family.

West said her parents recall that since she was tiny she was forever talking about becoming a veterinarian.

"I loved working with and helping animals...especially liked working with horses," West said in a recent interview.

As an undergraduate pursuing a microbiology degree at North Dakota State University, she and her quarter horse, Henry, competed on the school's rodeo club in team roping, and she maintained her violin playing by performing with a group at nearby Concordia College in Minnesota.

Later at Kansas State University's vet school, she worked toward an expertise in equine medicine and surgery.

She said she always planned to come back to North Dakota, but worked in Iowa for a time while her husband, a chemical engineer, had a position there.

He has since left that career, getting back into ranching at his grandparents' place north of Hettinger where the couple and their daughter, age 1, now live.

West said it was during vet school that she became familiar with the West River clinic. For needed college credits she worked at West River for a two-week unpaid externship. When one of the vets, Dr. Donald Safratowich retired, she was contacted about taking his place.

While a main focus is doctoring horses, she also works on every other type animal that walks in or is carried in: About every week they get animals that have been hit by cars or tractors and a lot by ATVS, she said.

Going out in the field, West and Innes have experienced hesitancy from some livestock producers when they show up.

"They'll ask, 'Where's one of the guys?'" Said West, who is 5 foot 3 inches tall.

But she said after they observe her at work, the outcomes, everything's fine.

"You do one job for them and they see you really know what you're doing and it's not an issue any longer," she said.

Innes said clients who are reluctant to accept a female vet are her favorite clients.

"I love clients like that. I make it my goal to win them over...prove myself," Innes said.

Innes said she has natural advantages like her small hands. She said ranchers have express how they wished they could do what she does.

With her small hands and arms she has an easier time getting in to help the mama cows, plus she has the tools and various techniques to make the job easier.

"More than nine times out of 10 they'll (the ranchers) end up saying, 'You're OK,' " Innes said.

But she said she also understands their attitudes: "My grandfather was an old-school rancher."

She said one thing that surprised her about being a veterinarian was the "compassion fatigue." She said from growing up on a ranch she knows it's expected that animals die, sometimes. It's understood and dealt with.

But when she as a vet can't save an animal like a past case, a dog that after five hours of surgery couldn't be saved that's tough.

"We care so much... I don't know if people realize how much we can take home," she said.

Innes said clinic's veterinarians are more than happy to and do take phone calls and questions from the general public about anything, from vaccination questions to whatever.

Innes said she is so proud to work at this state-of-the-art facility a 12,300-square-foot building on nine acres and hopes people will come to the open house April 21 to see it.

"We have some of the best medical equipment," she said.

And it's a team effort.

She said the veterinarians decided to have one group office in the new building instead of individual offices for each vet. That way, they sit together and discuss cases as a group. Sometimes, an x-ray is analyzed by more than one set of eyes.

"You get your money's worth...five vets for the price of one," Innes said.

Actually, 5.5 vets, because the retiree still comes in to help, she said.

The clinic's other vets besides Innes, West and Andress are Lisa Henderson, Bleaux Johnson and part-time help from longtime veterinarian Dr. Donald Safratowich, who is retired, sort of.

The rest is here:
State-of-art new clinic - and vets - The Dickinson Press

Scientists have long hoped that stem cells might have the power to treat diseases. But it's always been clear that they could be dangerous too, especially if they're not used carefully.

Now a pair of papers published Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine is underscoring both the promise and the peril of using stem cells for therapy.

In one report, researchers document the cases of three elderly women who were blinded after getting stem cells derived from fat tissue at a for-profit clinic in Florida. The treatment was marketed as a treatment for macular degeneration, the most common cause of blindness among the elderly. Each woman got cells injected into both eyes.

In a second report, a patient suffering from the same condition had a halt in the inexorable loss of vision patients usually experience, which may or may not have been related to the treatment. That patient got a different kind of stem cell derived from skin cells as part of a carefully designed Japanese study.

The Japanese case marks the first time anyone has given induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells to a patient to treat any condition.

"These two reports are about as stark a contrast as it gets," says George Q. Daley, Harvard Medical School's dean and a leading stem cell researcher. He wrote an editorial accompanying the two papers. "It's really striking."

The report about the three women in their 70s and 80s who were blinded in Florida is renewing calls for the Food and Drug Administration to crack down on the hundreds of clinics that are selling unproven stem cell treatments for a wide variety of medical conditions, including arthritis, autism and stroke.

"One of the big mysteries about this particular case and the mushrooming stem cell clinic industry more generally is why the FDA has chosen to effectively sit itself out on the sidelines even as this situation overall grows increasingly risky to patients," says Paul Knoepfler, a University of California, Davis, stem cell researcher who has studied the proliferation of stem cell clinics.

"The inaction by the FDA not only puts many patients at serious risk from unproven stem cell offerings, but also it undermines the agency's credibility," Knoepfler wrote in an email.

In response to a query from Shots, an FDA spokeswoman wrote in an email that the agency is in the process of finalizing four new guidelines aimed at clarifying how clinics could use stem cells as treatments. The agency also noted that it had previously issued a warning to patients.

In the meantime, "consumers are encouraged to contact FDA and the appropriate state authorities in their jurisdictions to report any potentially illegal or harmful activity related to stem cell based products," the FDA email says.

Other researchers say the cases should stand as a warning to patients considering unproved stem cell treatments, especially those tried outside carefully designed research studies.

"Patients have to be wary and tell the difference between the snake oil salesmen who are going to exploit them and the kind of slow, painstaking legitimate clinical trials that are also going on," Daley says.

The New England Journal of Medicine report did not name the Florida clinic, but noted that the treatment was listed on a government website that serves as a clearinghouse for research studies. The sponsor is listed as Bioheart, Inc., which is part of U.S. Stem Cell Inc. in Sunrise, Fla.

Kristen Comella, the scientific director of U.S. Stem Cell, would not discuss the cases. "There were legal cases associated with eye patients that were settled under confidentiality, so I am not permitted to speak on any details of those cases due to the confidentiality clause," Comella said by phone.

She acknowledged, however, that the clinic had been performing the stem cell procedures. They were discontinued after at least two patients suffered detached retinas, she says.

But Comella defended the use of stem cells from fat tissue to treat a wide variety of other health problems.

"We have treated more than 7,000 patients and we've have had very few adverse events reported. So the safety track record is very strong," Comella says. "We feel very confident about the procedures that we do, and we've had great success in many different indications."

According to the New England Journal of Medicine report, The Florida clinic was using adult stem cells, which circulate in various parts of the body, including in fat tissue. While those cells may someday be turn out to be useful for treating disease, none have been proven to work.

The body produces a variety of stem cells. The kind that have generated the most excitement and controversy are human embryonic stem cells, which are derived from early human embryos and can be coaxed to become any kind of cell in the body.

Scientists are also excited about iPS cells, which can be made in the laboratory by turning any cell in the body, such as skin cells, into cells that resemble embryonic stem cells.

Those are the cells that were tested by the Japanese scientists. The stem cells were converted into retinal pigment epithelium (RPE) cells, which are the cells that are destroyed by macular degeneration.

"This represents a landmark," says Daley. "It's the first time any patient has been treated with cellular derivatives of iPS cells. So it's definitely a world first."

Daley noted that the scientists only treated one of the patient's eyes in case something went wrong, to ensure remaining vision would not be threatened in the other eye.

After at least a year, no complications had occurred and the patient had not experienced any further deterioration of vision in the treated eye. While that is promising, more patients would have to be treated and followed for much longer to know whether that approach is successful, Daley says.

"Given that macular degeneration is the most frequent cause of vision loss and blindness in the elderly and our population is aging, the prevalence of macular degeneration is going up dramatically," Daley says. "So to be able to preserve or even restore sight would be a really remarkable medical advance."

Despite the potentially encouraging results with the first patient, Daley noted that the Japanese scientists decided not to treat a second patient and suspended the study. That's because they discovered worrisome genetic variations in the RPE cells they had produced for the second patient.

"They weren't certain these would cause problems for the patient, but they were restrained enough and cautious enough that they decided not to go forward," Daley says. "That's what contrasts so markedly with the approach of the second group, who treated the three patients with an unproven stem cell therapy that ended up have devastating effects on their vision."

In this case, the New England Journal of Medicine report says, patients paid $5,000 each to receive injections of solutions that supposedly contained stem cells that were obtained from fat removed from their abdomens through liposuction.

Even though the safety and effectiveness of this procedure is unknown, all three patients received injections in both eyes.

"That's what led to these horrible results," says Thomas Albini, a retina specialist at the University of Florida's Bascom Palmer Eye Institute, who helped write the report.

Before the procedure, all three women still had at least some vision. Afterwards, one woman was left completely blind while the other two were effectively blind, Albini and his colleagues reported.

The cases show that patients need to be warned that something that "sounds too good to be true may indeed be too good to be true and may even be horrible," Albini says.

See original here:
3 Women Blinded By Unproven Stem Cell Treatments - Alabama Public Radio

Shares of Nektar Therapeutics (NASDAQ:NKTR) dropped -1.01% by the end of trading session at $14.64. For the current quarter, the 5 brokerage firms issuing adjusted earnings per share outlook have a consensus forecast of -$0.34/share, which would compare with -$0.14 in the year-ago quarter. The net percentage change is 27.97% over the last 12 months. The trading range in the same period had a highest hit of $19.98 while lowest level was $11.22. At the moment the price is 13.56% above its 50-day moving average and -1.11% below its 200-day moving average.

Nektar Therapeutics (NASDAQ:NKTR) on March 2, 2017 announced that its corporate presentation will be webcast at the upcoming Cowen and Company 37th Annual Health Care Conference on Tuesday, March 7, 2017 at 11:20 a.m. Eastern time. Nektar Therapeutics is a research-based development stage biopharmaceutical company whose mission is to discover and develop innovative medicines to address the unmet medical needs of patients. Our R&D pipeline of new investigational medicines includes treatments for cancer, auto-immune disease and chronic pain. We leverage Nektars proprietary and proven chemistry platform in the discovery and design of our new therapeutic candidates. Nektar is headquartered in San Francisco, California, with additional operations in Huntsville, Alabama and Hyderabad, India.

Biostage, Inc. (NASDAQ:BSTG) last exchanged hands at a price $0.39/share, registering a gain of 9.68%. Among 1 Wall Street analysts tracked by Thomson/First Call, the average PT for BSTG is $3 but some of them are predicting the price to move at the $3 level. If the most optimistic analysts are correct, the expected total return from the current price would be 669.23. The number of shares traded in most recent trading day was 3.06M shares which averages 987.24K shares a day. Its previous fifty two week high was $2.86 and moved down -75.47% over the same time frame, currently having a market cap around $13.09 million. Shares have risen -51.55% over the trailing six months. At the moment, the stock trades -43.63% below its 50-day moving average and -59.6% below its 200-day moving average.

Biostage, Inc. (NASDAQ:BSTG) ) on March 2, 2017 announced that it will report its financial results for the year ended December 31, 2016 in a press release that will be issued pre-market on Thursday, March 9, 2017. Biostage Management also announced that it will host a conference call with live audio webcast that same day at 9:00 a.m. ET to review its operational progress, expected near-term milestones and financial report. Biostage is a biotechnology company developing bioengineered organ implants based on the Companys new Cellframe technology which combines a proprietary biocompatible scaffold with a patients own stem cells to create Cellspan organ implants. Cellspan implants are being developed to treat life-threatening conditions of the esophagus, bronchus or trachea with the hope of dramatically improving the treatment paradigm for patients. Based on its preclinical data, Biostage has selected life-threatening conditions of the esophagus as the initial clinical application of its technology.

The rest is here:
Hot Biotech Stocks Recap: Nektar Therapeutics (NASDAQ:NKTR), Biostage, Inc. (NASDAQ:BSTG) - The Voice Registrar

President Trump's clean coal agenda could get some much-needed clarity as federal advisers take a hard look at advanced technologies to make coal plants more competitive and climate-friendly, as Trump's plan to repeal regulations will only go so far toward restoring the industry.

Some of the experts slated to lead the discussion at this year's spring meeting of the National Coal Council, a federal advisory committee, are skeptical about how much Trump can actually do over the next four years to help the coal industry beyond removing regulations.

Eliminating regulations is only a short-term remedy for what ails the coal industry. Removing Obama-era climate regulations would stop some of the planned coal plant retirements while allowing for the construction of newer, more efficient coal plants, which are considered a variant of clean coal technology.

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Top consultants say the Trump agenda needs to be paired with a longer-term strategy that looks at more advanced technology such as carbon capture and storage, or CCS, which strips carbon pollution from coal plant emissions.

Amid Trump's promise to roll back climate change rules and withdraw from the Paris climate accord, much of the talk at the March 14-15 meeting will be on ways to make the coal industry more climate-friendly through the use of CCS. But even that isn't a sure fix, and it won't have job benefits for years to come, which is Trump's primary goal.

"I think everything that drives [Trump's] policy decisions is geared at the top level, first and foremost, to jobs," said Andy Roberts, research director for energy consultants Wood Mackenzie. "He wants to restore better economic health to the energy industry."

Roberts will deliver the keynote address, aptly named "Opportunities for Coal in the Trump Administration," at the coal council meeting, according to the official agenda.

When it comes to Trump's jobs priorities, Roberts doesn't see "clean coal" technologies that Trump continues to tout offering much in the way of putting miners back to work, at least not quickly.

Also from the Washington Examiner

"At the very least you can imagine them playing a provocative role," said Rep. Peter Roskam, R-Ill.,

03/06/17 12:01 AM

"In the short-term, that means unburdening the industry from regulations to the extent [coal] competes on a level playing field," Roberts said. But clean coal technologies, primarily carbon capture and storage, "don't really impact employment in the industry in the short term and medium term at all."

"It's not economic," Roberts added. "It's never going to be economic versus other forms of energy production." But it may still be necessary, he said, "depending on what the world decides it's going to do about topics like climate change."

That's why the primary thrust of the coal meeting will be focused on CCS and enhancing "the efficiency and emissions profile of our coal fleet," according to the agenda. However, the focus of the advisory panel in Trump's first year has not been determined, Janet Gellici, the National Coal Council's CEO, said before Rick Perry was confirmed as energy secretary Thursday. The coal council reports to the secretary.

The coal council under former President Barack Obama focused on legislative and policy recommendations for advancing CCS and even more advanced technologies that use the carbon to generate additional revenue stream for power plants.

One of the technologies that will be highlighted at this month's meeting will come from a company that has been collaborating with Exxon Mobil to commercialize a form of CCS technology for reducing emissions at natural gas power plants. The company sees fuel cells as a solution to the next big challenge for cutting carbon dioxide emissions, which is anticipated to be focused on natural gas power plants.

Also from the Washington Examiner

With Trump in the White House and a GOP Congress, financial firms are well-positioned for looser regulation.

03/06/17 12:01 AM

Currently, natural gas-fired plants are taking market share from coal, since they release 60 percent fewer emissions than coal plants. Gas plants, according to Exxon Mobil, are the reason the nation's emissions are at their lowest in 25 years.

Nevertheless, any advancements in cutting carbon pollution further will stem from advancements that will come from developing CCS at coal plants, said officials with the company FuelCell Energy, which is collaborating with Exxon on CCS. Capturing carbon from natural gas is slightly different than capturing it from coal, but advancements on either would help the other fuel.

Officials with FuelCell Energy will be discussing its projects with the Energy Department, as well as the joint venture it has with Exxon. They say Trump's focus on manufacturing is good for clean coal, but also for cleaner forms of natural gas that they anticipate being needed further down the road.

"One aspect that we're certainly encouraged with is the focus on American manufacturing," said Kurt Goddard, head of investor relations for the company. "Because fuel cells represent American innovation, they represent American manufacturing."

Fuel cells had support in previous Republican administrations. Former president George W. Bush created the hydrogen fuel cell initiative to wean the nation off its "addiction to oil." But it's not clear if Trump might do something similar.

Fuel cells are a highly efficient means of producing electricity. Rather than burning a fuel, like a standard power plant does, they produce electricity through a chemical process using an electrolyte similar to a battery. But instead of charging it as a battery, the electrolyte is refilled. FuelCell Energy's device concentrates the carbon dioxide from a coal-fired power plant as part of its electricity-generation process. The process reduces carbon emissions and other pollutants.

It's also a form of clean energy that is completely made in America, Goddard said. "Our manufacturing facility is actually in Connecticut, whereas some other forms of clean power generation aren't necessarily made in the U.S.," he said, explaining why he believes Trump is supportive of CCS. It's a technology that is evolving, he said, with interest coming from Exxon, the Canadian oil sands and Europe.

Anthony Leo, the company's vice president for technology and applications, will discuss its fuel cell clean coal project at this month's meeting, in addition to the natural gas work he is doing with Exxon Mobil. The coal and gas projects are both being done at Southern Co.'s Barry Plant in Alabama.

The projects are in the engineering phase, with construction not expected to begin for about two years. Exxon CEO Darren Woods underscored the project in a blog post last month.

"Our role as the country's largest producer of natural gas which emits up to 60 percent less CO2 than coal for power generation has helped bring CO2 emissions in the United States to the lowest level since the 1990s," said Woods, who took over after predecessor Rex Tillerson was appointed secretary of state.

"But the world also will need breakthrough clean-energy technologies such as carbon capture and storage," he said, noting that the company is "investing heavily in CCS, including research in a novel technology that uses fuel cells that could make CCS more affordable and expand its use."

An Exxon official emphasized to the Washington Examiner that the company's piece of the project has received no funding or support from the government.

Roberts observed that the future of CCS could very well resemble what is being demonstrated between the fuel cell company and Exxon. He also said the "model" for clean coal could follow what is happening between SpaceX and NASA, where a private company "is driving a lot of our national space exploration activities, right now, at the direction of NASA but with cooperation."

Roberts sees demand for clean coal technology coming from Europe, where the continent's climate change policies require the technologies, even if Trump succeeds in exiting from the Paris climate agreement.

"Maybe if the U.S. steps back for a while, the driving factors happen in Europe," Roberts said.

Coal use is projected to grow globally, and there will be an increasing need for coal power plants to be made more efficient and with fewer emissions, said Benjamin Sporton, the head of the World Coal Association. He was in Washington last month to discuss advancements on coal technology with congressional staffers.

He was also in the U.S. as part of an International Energy Agency industry advisory team meeting with coal companies to get a sense of where they are on technology development, he told the Washington Examiner in an interview.

"For me it's a continuum," he said. "It's not saying let's leap to CCS today, because CCS is not a technology that is viable for widescale deployment today. It's about saying how we start on that pathway to get to somewhere further down the track."

Expanding federal incentives for carbon capture technologies was an idea supported by both parties last year. And a lobbying push by unlikely bedfellows, major coal companies and environmentalists, is gaining steam to move a similar bill in this Congress.

"When utilities, coal companies and environmental groups come together to support your bill, you know you're onto something that could work," Democratic Sen. Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota said last year in introducing her bill to expand the coal incentives. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky was a co-sponsor of the legislation.

More here:
Trump's coal council to drill down on advanced technology - Washington Examiner

Ali Brivanlou slides open a glass door at the Rockefeller University in New York to show off his latest experiments probing the mysteries of the human embryo.

"As you can see, all my lab is glass just to make sure there is nothing that happens in some dark rooms that gives people some weird ideas," says Brivanlou, perhaps only half joking.

Brivanlou knows that some of his research makes some people uncomfortable. That's one reason he has agreed to give me a look at what's going on.

His lab and one other discovered how to keep human embryos alive in lab dishes longer than ever before at least 14 days. That has triggered an international debate about a long-standing convention (one that's legally binding in some countries, though not in the U.S.) that prohibits studying human embryos that have developed beyond the two-week stage.

And in other experiments, he's using human stem cells to create entities that resemble certain aspects of primitive embryos. Though Brivanlou doesn't think these "embryoids" would be capable of developing into fully formed embryos, their creation has stirred debate about whether embryoids should be subject to the 14-day rule.

Brivanlou says he welcomes these debates. But he hopes society can reach a consensus to permit his work to continue, so he can answer some of humanity's most fundamental questions.

"If I can provide a glimpse of, 'Where did we come from? What happened to us, for us to get here?' I think that, to me, is a strong enough rationale to continue pushing this," he says.

For decades, scientists thought the longest an embryo could survive outside the womb was only about a week. But Brivanlou's lab, and one in Britain, announced last year in the journals Nature and Nature Cell Biology that they had kept human embryos alive for two weeks for the first time.

That enabled the scientists to study living human embryos at a crucial point in their development, a time when they're usually hidden in a woman's womb.

"Women don't even know they are pregnant at that stage. So it has always been a big black box," Brivanlou says.

Gist Croft, a stem cell biologist in Brivanlou's lab, shows me some samples, starting with one that's 12 days old.

"So you can see this with the naked eye," Croft says, pointing to a dish. "In the middle of this well, if you look down, there's a little white speck it looks like a grain of sand or a piece of dust."

Under a microscope, the embryo looks like a fragile ball of overlapping bubbles shimmering in a silvery light with thin hairlike structures extending from all sides.

Croft and Brivanlou explain that those willowy structures are what embryos would normally extend at this stage to search for a place to implant inside the uterus. Scientists used to think embryos could do that only if they were receiving instructions from the mother's body.

"The amazing thing is that it's doing its thing without any information from mom," Brivanlou says. "It just has all the information already in it. That was mind-blowing to me."

The embryos they managed to keep alive in the lab dish beyond seven days of development have also started secreting hormones and organizing themselves to form the cells needed to create all the tissues and organs in the human body.

The two scientists think studying embryos at this and later stages could lead to discoveries that might point to new ways to stop miscarriages, treat infertility and prevent birth defects.

"The only way to understand what goes wrong is to understand what happens normally, or as normally as we can, so we can prevent all of this," Brivanlou says.

The 14-day cutoff

But Brivanlou isn't keeping these embryos alive longer than 14 days because of the rule.

"The decision about pulling the plug was probably the toughest decision I've made in my scientific career," he says. "It was sad for me."

The 14-day rule was developed decades ago to avoid raising too many ethical questions about experimenting on human embryos.

Two weeks is usually the moment when the central nervous system starts to appear in the embryo in a structure known as the "primitive streak."

It's also roughly the stage at which an embryo can no longer split into twins. The idea behind the rule is, that's when an embryo becomes a unique individual.

But the rule was initiated when no one thought it would ever be possible to keep embryos growing in a lab beyond two weeks. Brivanlou thinks it's time to rethink the 14-day rule.

"This is the moment," he says.

Scientists, bioethicists and others are debating the issue in the U.S., Britain and other countries. The rule is law in Britain and other countries and incorporated into widely followed guidelines in the United States.

Insoo Hyun, a bioethicist at Case Western Reserve University, advocates revisiting the rule. It would allow more research to be done on embryos that are destined to be destroyed anyway, he says embryos donated by couples who have finished infertility treatment.

"Given that it has to be destroyed," Hyun says, "some would argue that it's best to get as much information as possible scientifically from it before you destroy it."

But others find it morally repugnant to use human embryos for research at any stage of their development and argue that lifting the 14-day rule would make matters worse.

"Pushing it beyond 14 days only aggravates what is the primary problem, which is using human life in its earliest stages solely for experimental purposes," says Dr. Daniel Sulmasy, a Georgetown University bioethicist.

The idea of extending the 14-day rule even makes some people who support embryo research queasy, especially without first finding another clear stopping point.

Hank Greely, a Stanford University bioethicist, worries that going beyond 14 days could "really draws into question whether we're using humans or things that are well along the path to humans purely as guinea pigs and purely as experimental animals."

Embryo alternative: "Embryoids"

So as that debate continues, Brivanlou and his colleagues are trying to develop another approach. The scientists are attempting to coax human embryonic stem cells to organize themselves into entities that resemble human embryos. They are also using induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells, which are cells that behave like embryonic stem cells, but can be made from any cell in the body.

Brivanlou's lab has already shown that these "embryo-like structures" or "embryoids" can create the three fundamental cell types in the human body.

But the scientists have only been able to go so far using flat lab dishes. So the researchers are now trying to grow these embryonic-like structures in three dimensions by placing stem cells in a gel.

"Essentially, we're trying to, in a way, to re-create a human embryo in a dish starting from stem cells," says Mijo Simunovic, another of Brivanlou's colleagues.

In early experiments, Simunovic says, he has been able to get stem cells to "spontaneously" form a ball with a "cavity in its center." That's significant because that's what early human embryos do in the uterus.

Simunovic says it's unclear how close these structures could become to human embryos entities that have the capability to develop into babies.

"At the moment, we don't know. That's something that's very hot for us right now to try to understand," Simunovic says.

Simunovic argues the scientists are not "ethically limited to studying these cells and studying these structures" by the 14-day rule.

There's a debate about that, however.

"At what point is your model of an embryo basically an embryo?" asks Hyun, especially when the model seems to have "almost like this inner, budding life."

"Are we creating life that, in the right circumstances, if you were to transfer this to the womb it would continue its journey?" he asks.

Dr. George Daley, the dean of the Harvard Medical School and a leading stem cell researcher, says scientists have been preparing for the day when stem-cell research might raise such questions.

"I think what prospects people are concerned about are the kinds of dystopian worlds that were written about by Aldous Huxley in Brave New World," Daley says. "Where human reproduction is done on a highly mechanized scale in a petri dish."

Daley stresses scientists are nowhere near that, and may never get there. But science moves quickly. So Daley says it's important scientists move carefully with close ethical scrutiny.

The latest guidelines issued by the International Society for Stem Cell Research call for intensive ethical review, Daley notes.

Brivanlou acknowledges that some of his experiments have produced early signs of the primitive streak. But that's a very long way from being able to develop a spinal cord, or flesh and bones, let alone a brain. He dismisses the notion that the research on embryoids would ever lead to scientists creating humans in a lab dish.

"They will not get up start walking around. I can assure you that," he says, noting that full human embryonic development is a highly complex process that requires just the right mix of the biology, physics, geometry and other factors.

Nevertheless, Brivanlou says all of his experiments go through many layers of review. And he's convinced the research should continue.

"It would be a travesty," he says, "to decide that, somehow, ignorance is bliss."

RACHEL MARTIN, HOST:

Scientists doing embryo research are facing some sensitive questions over a new generation of scientific experiments, questions like how long should scientists be allowed to keep human embryos alive in their labs to study them? And should entities that they create from stem cells resembling human embryos be treated the same way? NPR's health correspondent Rob Stein visited a lab that's at the forefront of this provocative research, and he brings us now the first of two reports.

ROB STEIN, BYLINE: So what are we going to see first?

ALI BRIVANLOU: A human embryo that is attached and grown for 13 days in a petri dish.

STEIN: Ali Brivanlou runs the lab at The Rockefeller University in midtown Manhattan.

So this is an embryo that - where you were able to keep it alive in the laboratory...

BRIVANLOU: Exactly.

STEIN: ...Up until day...

BRIVANLOU: Day 13.

STEIN: And had it been done before?

BRIVANLOU: Never.

STEIN: For decades, scientists thought the longest an embryo could survive outside the womb was only about half that long - only about a week tops. So this is the first time scientists can actually see living human embryos at this crucial stage of development and study them at a time when they're usually hidden in a woman's womb.

BRIVANLOU: And women don't even know they are pregnant at that stage, so it has always been a big black box.

STEIN: Brivanlou arranged for one of his colleagues to show me.

BRIVANLOU: I ask him to make sure that he has a real sample for you to see with your own eyes so that you can appreciate the beauty in their own glory. It's really one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen in my life.

STEIN: Brivanlou's colleague Gist Croft pulls out some samples. Turns out, he's going to show me several embryos, starting with one that's 12 days old.

GIST CROFT: So you can see this with the naked eye. In the middle of this well, if you look down, there's a little white speck that looks like a grain of sand or a piece of dust in this well right here. I don't know if you can - can you see that?

STEIN: Yeah, it looks like a tiny little white translucent dot.

CROFT: That's it.

STEIN: Croft carefully places it on a big microscope and pulls a heavy black curtain closed.

CROFT: Would you like to look through the microscope?

STEIN: Yeah.

BRIVANLOU: OK.

STEIN: Croft helps me bring the embryo into focus.

Oh, yeah, I can see...

CROFT: Better?

STEIN: I can see the - oh, wow. Wow, that's, like, kind of beautiful.

It is quite stunning. It looks like a fragile ball of overlapping bubbles that's sort of shimmering in a silvery light, but it's also a little, well, funny looking.

So that looks like a (laughter) well, I mean, it kind of just looks like a - kind of a translucent hairy ball actually.

CROFT: Yes.

STEIN: Croft and Brivanlou get excited that I noticed what looked like little hairs reaching out from all sides because that's exactly what scientists would expect embryos to do at this stage if they were in the womb - search for just the right spot to nestle in.

CROFT: They're doing the reaching out and attaching that they normally do into uterus cells, but here they're doing it onto plastic.

STEIN: Wow, so they're behaving like they would - this embryo is behaving like it would if it was actually in the womb.

CROFT: That's right. It's reproducing certain key features of what it's normally doing in the womb.

STEIN: Scientists thought embryos could only do that sort of thing if they were getting instructions from their mother's body about what to do next - not all alone in some plastic dish.

BRIVANLOU: The amazing thing is that it's doing its thing without any information from mom - completely unexpected to me. It just has all the information already in it. That was mind-blowing to me.

STEIN: The embryos also start pumping out hormones and start organizing themselves, all by themselves, to form the cells needed to create all the tissues and organs that make up the human body. So Brivanlou and his colleagues think they could learn lots of things by studying them that could help stop miscarriages, treat infertility, prevent birth defects.

BRIVANLOU: The only way to understand what goes wrong is to understand what happens normally or as normally as we can so we can prevent all of this.

STEIN: But that would mean studying embryos beyond 14 days and Brivanlou can't keep these embryos alive any longer to keep studying them. Why? Because of a rule that says scientists should not conduct experiments on human embryos that are more than 14 days old. So Brivanlou decided he had no choice but to pull the plug on these experiments.

BRIVANLOU: The decision about pulling the plug was probably the toughest decision I've made in my scientific career. It was sad for me. It was sad.

STEIN: The 14-day rule was adopted decades ago to avoid raising too many ethical questions. It's a guideline in the U.S. but law in some other countries. Fourteen days is when the central nervous system starts forming, starting with something called the primitive streak. It's also usually when an embryo can't split into twins anymore. So the idea is that's when it truly becomes an individual. But that was before anyone thought it would ever be possible to go beyond two weeks. So Brivanlou says it's time to rethink the 14-day rule.

BRIVANLOU: It's time to reopen that debate. This is the moment. I think we are here. It would be a travesty to decide that somehow ignorance is bliss.

STEIN: And Brivanlou's not alone. There's a big debate about this going on in the United States, Britain and other countries. Insoo Hyun is a bioethicist at the Case Western Reserve University. He points out that these are embryos that were donated for research by couples who were finished with infertility treatments.

INSOO HYUN: You have to realize that with these embryos they are being used for research. That decision has been made. Now, the question is how long can you study them before they have to be destroyed? So given that it has to be destroyed, some would argue that it's best to get as much information as possible scientifically from it before you destroy it.

STEIN: Now, some people think it's morally repugnant to use human embryos for any kind of research at any stage of their development. And lifting the 14-day rule, that would just make matters worse. But the idea of extending the 14-day rule even makes some people who support embryo research uncomfortable, especially without first coming up with another clear stopping point. Hank Greely is a bioethicist at Stanford.

HANK GREELY: Unless there was something really important we could learn from doing research with human embryos, I wouldn't allow research beyond 14 days because at some point experimentation with it seems to really draw into question whether we're using humans or things that are well along the path to humans purely as guinea pigs and purely as experimental animals.

STEIN: So as that debate continues, Brivanlou and his colleagues are trying something else. They're using stem cells to create things that resemble primitive human embryos in their lab, but that's controversial too. Rob Stein, NPR News, New York.

Continued here:
Embryo Experiments Reveal Earliest Human Development, But Stir Ethical Debate - Alabama Public Radio

Floyd Ingram | Buy at photos.chickasawjournal.com Dream Big, featuring Sundancer, debuted at the Tennessee Aquarium in Chattanooga last week with members of the Houston Solar Car team in attendance. Members are Kailey Stevens, from left, Malik Lawrence, James Ingram, Micah Simmons and Greg Hollingsworth.

By Floyd Ingram

Chickasaw Journal

HOUSTON Sundancer was featured in a documentary film that debuted last week at cinemas around the country, and part of that rollout saw it put on display at the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, D.C.

Houston Solar Car team members also headed out to Washington, Chattanooga, Birmingham and Huntsville Alabama, for the premier of Dream Big, a film aimed at growing the next generation of engineers to serve both the United States and the world.

I was inspired by a fifth grade science teacher in a day and age when girls were not encouraged to go into engineering, said Mary Beth Hudson, site manager of Wacker Polysilicon in Charleston, Tennessee. Engineers will solve the problems we face in the future. I think it is obvious to us all, we need more engineers.

Hudson spoke before the premier of Dream Big at the Tennessee Aquarium in Chattanooga last Friday. Hudson, who runs the $2.5 billion plant that makes a key material used in solar cells, said her passion is getting kids excited about careers in engineering.

I am so impressed with what your solar car team has done, Hudson said. The next generation of engineers are all around us. We need to spot them, educate them and put them in companies that are working on solutions to solve the worlds problems.

The Houston Solar Car team was featured for about six minutes in the 45-minute documentary. The segment told of a small high school in Mississippi that fielded a solar car that went to Australia in 2015 and raced the most miles under solar power in the 2,000 mile World Solar Car Challenge across the Australian Outback.

Sundancer finished the race with 2,795 solar car kilometers, or 1,736 miles, racing all but 227 kilometers of the 3,022 kilometer race from Darwin to Adelaide.

The film premiered in giant-screen theaters during Engineers Week, Feb. 17-25, around the country.

Sundancer, right, and the University of Michigan solar car were on display at the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, D.C. (Courtesy)

Houston Career and Technology Education Center solar car sponsor and chaperons carried students Hunter Moore and Andrew Mitchell along with Sundancer to Washington for the premier there.

Narrated by Academy Award winner Jeff Bridges, Dream Big: Engineering Our World is a first of its kind film for IMAX and giant screen theaters that seeks to transform how we think about engineering.

The film urges teachers, schools and companies to answer the call of the STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) initiative which offers a fresh perspective on engineering and aims to inspire kids of diverse backgrounds to become the innovators, educators and leaders who will improve the lives of people across our entire planet throughout the 21st Century.

STEM was implemented in the Houston School District last year.

For more information about Dream Big, go to http://www.dreambigfilm.com. Click the sneak peak trailer to view a 2-minute video. Click the icon marked Press to see photos of the Houston Solar Car team in Australia.

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Houston Solar Car featured in IMAX film, Smithsonian - Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal

Officials confirm 6 new MERS cases, 1 death in Saudi Arabia

Over the past 4 days, Saudi Arabia's Ministry of Health (MOH) reported a flurry of MERS cases, one of them fatal and all involving men.

The MOH said on Feb 17 that a 74-year-old Saudi man from Jeddah was in critical condition after presenting with symptoms of MERS-CoV (Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus) infection. The man had direct contact with camels, and the MOH listed the patient as deceased in an update yesterday. The update said he had a preexisting condition.

Also yesterday, the MOH reported two more cases in men who had direct contact with camels. A 57-year-old from Jeddah and a 67-year-old from Riyadh are both listed in critical condition.

Finally today, the MOH announced three more new cases in Saudi men. A 63-year-old from Muhayil is in critical condition and had direct contact with camels. A 49-year-old from Riyadh is also in critical condition. The source of his infection is listed as "primary," meaning it is unlikely he contracted the virus from another person, but camel contact is not mentioned. And a 61-year-old from Jeddah with MERS is in stable condition. His infection is also listed as primary.

The cases raise the country's MERS total to 1,563 cases, including 650 deaths. Eleven patients are still being treated for the disease. Feb 17 MOH report Feb 19 MOH report Feb 20 MOH report

A new study in the Journal of the Pediatric Infectious Diseases Society reports high rates of antimicrobial resistance in Indian neonatal and pediatric bloodstream infections.

The meta-analysis of 82 papers on antibiotic resistance in Indian children published from 2000 through 2015 included a total of 50,545 blood cultures, with the majority of bloodstream infections (78.7%) being reported from neonatal intensive care units. Among the 72 studies that reported gram-positive bacteria, the median percentage of gram-positive bacteria was 29.2%. In the 81 studies that reported on gram-negative bacteria, the median percentage among all reported positive cultures was 61%. Staphylococcus aureus was found to be the most common gram-positive isolates (median, 14.7%) and Klebsiella pneumoniae was found to be the most common gram-negative isolate (median, 26%).

Fifty percent of the S aureus isolates were methicillin resistant, with high resistance for S aureus to erythromycin (53%), cefotaxime (57%), and cotrimoxazole (57.7%) also noted. High levels of resistance were reported in K pneumoniae to ampicillin (95.2%) and cephalosporins (over 60%). After age stratification, the median resistance of common gram-negative pathogens to the World Health Organization-recommended combination of ampicillin and gentamicin for the treatment of neonatal sepsis was found to be extremely high (K pneumoniae/ampicillin 95.9%; K pneumoniae/gentamicin 75%; Escherichia coli/ampicillin 92.9%; E coli gentamicin 55.6%), with high resistance to cephalosporins also noted.

The authors note that while national guidelines for antimicrobial use have been launched in India, the study highlights a need for similar guidelines in neonates and children. More importantly, they write, "the awareness about the magnitude of antibiotic resistance and the essence of rational antibiotic use needs to be highlighted more urgently among practicing physicians and families." Feb 18 J Pediatric Infect Dis Soc study

The World Organization (WHO) said today that 11 cases of Seoul virus, a disease transmitted by rats, have been identified in the United States since December. Two of the 11 patients have been hospitalized, and all cases have been tied to rat-breeding practices. This is the first known Seoul outbreak connected to pet rats in the United States.

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported eight US Seoul virus cases on Jan 24.

So far people in Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Colorado have tested positive for the disease, which is a rare type of hantavirus that is transmitted from rats to humans through urine, droppings, or saliva of infected rodents, or after exposure to dust from their nests or bedding. The disease is not transmitted from person to person, and no treatment exists for the virus. Rarely, hemorrhagic fever with renal syndrome can develop.

All of the cases have been tied to ratteries or home pet rat-breeding sites. According to the WHO, follow-up investigations indicate that infected rats may have been distributed or received in Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, North Dakota, South Carolina, Tennessee, Utah, and Wisconsin. All affected facilities are limited to the pet rat trade. Feb 20 WHO report Jan 25 CIDRAP News scan on CDC report

Three new studies published today look at how Zika spread so rapidly in the Americas, and why and how the virus causes significant brain damage and microcephaly in children.

Authors writing in bioRxiv, a preprint server, generated 100 Zika virus genomes in an effort to understand how and why the virus spread so rapidly in 2015 and 2016. They found the samples had great genomic diversity, and dating analysis showed that four clades of the virus circulated in early- to mid-2015, a full year before the first detected case in several countries, including Peru and United States (in Florida). The study highlights the difficulties of Zika surveillance in countries where other flaviviruses also circulate.

A cell-culture study in Stem Cell Reports helps explain why Zika virus can cause microcephaly, or small head circumference, in infants. Scientists from the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston (UTMB) said that microcephaly occurs when the Zika virus attacks a developing fetus's stem cells. The authors discovered that the Asian, but not African, lineage of Zika viruses causes the stem cells to stop proliferating in the developing fetus.

"We discovered that the Asian lineage Zika virus halted the proliferation of brain stem cells and hindered their ability to develop into brain nerve cells," said Ping Wu, MD, PhD, senior author on the study and UTMB professor in the Department of Neuroscience & Cell Biology, in a press release from UTMB. "This difference seems to be linked with a Zika-induced change in global gene expression pattern, it remains to be seen which genes are responsible."

Finally today, JAMA Pediatrics published the results of a September 2016 workshop sponsored by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development and the National Institutes of Health to identify the key components of caring for children born with Zika-related microcephaly and other complications.

Many children, experts agree, may not have microcephaly at birth but may develop neurologic disorders because of prenatal Zika infection. Further study will be needed to anticipate and predict outcomes for children who were exposed, the experts said. Feb 20 bioRxiv study Feb 20 Stem Cell Reports study Feb 20 UTMB news release Feb 20 JAMA Pediatrics study

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News Scan for Feb 20, 2017 - CIDRAP

To paraphrase an age-old saying: If at first you don't succeed, well, dust off the historic launch pad and try another liftoff.

Not as catchy as the original, perhaps, but certainly fitting for SpaceX, which succeeded Sunday on its second launch attempt at NASA's Launch Complex 39A, at Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The first attempt, scrubbed Saturday with just 13 seconds before liftoff, was foiled by concerns over an anomaly discovered in the rocket's steering system.

The issue was "99% likely to be fine," Elon Musk, founder of the private space company, tweeted Saturday, "but that 1% chance isn't worth rolling the dice. Better to wait a day."

On Sunday, however, the launch went smoothly. Not only did SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket lift off without a hitch, its first stage also returned to land right back on a platform on Earth. Shortly afterward, the Dragon spacecraft it was carrying detached as planned from the rocket.

While there's nothing particularly rare about the 5,500 pounds of cargo strapped into that spacecraft which is destined for the International Space Station the pad it took off from has quite a backstory: Launch Complex 39A was the site that sent the first humans to the moon in the 1969 Apollo 11 mission.

It was the pad for a number of NASA's most important missions from its early days sending people to space, to the three decades of the space shuttle program.

Now the pad, which hadn't been used since that program ended in 2011, is getting dusted off for a new era "as a spaceport open for use by public and commercial missions to space," NPR's Rae Ellen Bichell reported for our Newscast unit.

As we noted Saturday, NASA says SpaceX's resupply mission packs supplies and materials for more than a few experiments:

"Science investigations launching on Dragon include commercial and academic research investigations that will enable researchers to advance their knowledge of the medical, psychological and biomedical challenges astronauts face during long-duration spaceflight.

"One experiment will use the microgravity environment to grow stem cells that are of sufficient quality and quantity to use in the treatment of patients who have suffered a stroke. A Merck Research Labs investigation will test growth in microgravity of antibodies important for fighting a wide range of human diseases, including cancer."

Reuters reports that NASA is also carefully monitoring the launch by SpaceX, which it "hired to fly cargo to the station after the shuttle program ended." The news service says NASA wants "to learn more about SpaceX's operations before it clears the company to fly NASA astronauts on SpaceX rockets."

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On Second Attempt, SpaceX Launches Rocket At NASA's Historic Pad - Alabama Public Radio

Updated at 10:25 a.m. ET

Poised on the brink of ushering in a new era, NASA's historic launch pad in Florida will need to wait another day for its milestone. At the last minute, the private space company SpaceX scrubbed its Saturday launch, which would have marked the first time the Kennedy Space Center's Launch Complex 39A was used in over half a decade.

Instead, the launch will wait at least 24 hours while SpaceX takes a "closer look at positioning of the second stage engine nozzle," an anomaly that came to light shortly before liftoff. The company plans to try again on Sunday.

Taken on its face, the launch itself is not particularly notable. Naturally, it's no mean feat to send a rocket to space, but missions like this one happen all the time. The International Space Station needs provisions, after all, and the 5,500 pounds of supplies and materials for scientific experiments would be a common (if still impressive) load for a resupply mission.

Rather, the liftoff now scheduled for Sunday is making history not for its cargo but precisely where it will be taking place: the pad that served as the launch site for the Apollo 11 mission that first sent humans to the moon in 1969.

In fact, Launch Complex 39A served as a pad for many of the most famous missions in NASA's history from the first missions to space that packed a human crew, to the decades-long space shuttle program that helped construct the orbiting station SpaceX's rocket will be supplying.

As NPR's Rae Ellen Bichell reports for our Newscast unit, the SpaceX mission marks something of a sea change for the historic launch pad:

"According to NASA, this will be the first time the launch pad has been used since the shuttle program ended in 2011 and it will mark the beginning of a new era for the Kennedy Space Center as a spaceport open for use by public and commercial missions to space."

SpaceX, a privately owned space company, is sending its NASA cargo and the Dragon spacecraft that bears it with a Falcon 9 rocket. In a statement, NASA says SpaceX also plans to attempt to land the first stage of the Falcon 9 back on a platform, as it did during its successful launch last month.

NASA also explains some of the experiments this launch will be supporting:

"Science investigations launching on Dragon include commercial and academic research investigations that will enable researchers to advance their knowledge of the medical, psychological and biomedical challenges astronauts face during long-duration spaceflight.

"One experiment will use the microgravity environment to grow stem cells that are of sufficient quality and quantity to use in the treatment of patients who have suffered a stroke. A Merck Research Labs investigation will test growth in microgravity of antibodies important for fighting a wide range of human diseases, including cancer."

According to NASA, the mission will also aid in recording "key climate observations and data records."

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A Liftoff Deferred: SpaceX Mission From NASA's Historic Launch Pad Delayed - Alabama Public Radio