another request – this time it’s stem cells

This time, the daughter tells me, she’s doing a project on a ‘current issue’ – & she’s selected stem cells. Current, controversial, contentious – & extremely interesting. But again, I’m not an expert (although my colleague Bjorn Oback, at AgResearch, is doing some very interesting work in that area & in fact received a Kudos award for his research in 2007). So this time, I thought I’d just point you at a couple of places to get started, if you’ve chosen this topic too.

One is a fact sheet that Bjorn put together for us when he spoke at a Cafe Scientifique, a couple of years ago now. (It was a great Cafe session. We must get him back for an update…)

And the other is a post & its related discussion that fellow science blogger Ken Perrot has put up over at Open Parachute. I think this one’s particularly valuable for when you’re doing the ‘social & ethical’ aspects of your project, because the discussion that’s going on presents opposing points of view very clearly.

There’s plenty more out there on the web – just remember to apply your critical thinking skills to what you find, as the quality of what’s available is (as my mother used to say) like the curate’s egg: good in parts 🙂

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