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the newspaper Starving Artists
Stem Cell Research Suddenly Not So Evil Researchers discover a humane way of gathering stem cells
Photo by Evan Jordan
By Steven Borowiec and Rehaana Manek
From left to right: Alex Coley, Mariuxi Zambrano, Maha Javadi
The Only Thing Separating These Students from Graduation is $8000 By Joe Zabukovec It all started when Mariuxi Zambrano walked into the newspaper headquarters selling muffins for $1 each. In order for her to graduate U of T’s Fine Arts program, she and her eleven other classmates must raise $8000 to sponsor their own art show. With the Fine Arts department only contributing around $500, that still leaves them $7500 short. This is the smallest Thesis Project class that the Fine Arts program has ever had, which puts more pressure and stress on the 12 individuals to come up with money. Two of her classmates, Mahan Javadi and Alex Coley, came back with her the next day to explain their goal and the methods they are using to reach it. I asked Alex
what that $8000 would end up paying for. “We have to rent the space and make the brochures. We have to advertise, and we have to pay for insurance, install walls … it’s a lot of work.” But like many group projects, they are currently having some issues with teamwork. With time as an issue, this is becoming a large stress factor -Mahan reluctantly elaborated for me. “A big problem we have is that everyone can be pretty uncooperative, so we all end up doing our own things to raise the money. People say they’re going to do something and then they don’t, so now everyone just has to come up with their share of the money.” The tiny class is still doing See Student Artists cont. pg. 3
By Timothy Ryan Recall the oft-debated topic of stem cell research, one that still occasionally grabs the major media spotlight from time to time. The jist of the argument tells that in order to start a stem cell line for study and disease treatment, a human embryo must die. In the pro-life corner (where George W. Bush and most other conservative Christians reside), the case is made that a human embryo is a human life, therefore deserving protection. Contrarily, in medicine’s corner (where scientists such as myself reside), it is believed that this research is going to lead to medical breakthroughs and treatments for major diseases. Embryonic stem cells are desired because they can develop into many types of tissue. They all begin as identical main stem cells and as the embryo develops and requires heart cells, brain cells, spinal cord cells as examples, these main stem cells differentiate and morph into the needed cell types. Thus, a damaged heart muscle resulting from a heart attack in an adult patient could potentially be replaced by new stem cells. Scientists believe that numerous diseases can be treated in this fashion, including diabetes,
cancer, cardiovascular disease, Alzheimer’s, burn victims, and blood disease to name a few. Enter the new work about to be published by two research groups in the journals Cell and Science in the coming days. Groups led by Dr. Shinya Yamanaka of Kyoto University and James Thomson of the University of Wisconsin-Madison are racing to publish the same result; they have generated stem cells from adult human skin. This would potentially provide all the benefits of embryonic stem cell research, without the controversy. The process is called “direct programming” and it involves taking four genes and inserting them into a virus. The virus then infects the human skin cell and through some unknown process, the skin cells morph into stem cells, capable of being differentiated into unique tissue types once again. This has massive implications. Leaders in this scientific field are using funny metaphors to describe the impact it may have on medicine. One equates it to “learning to turn lead into gold” while another believes it will help us fly, “the equivalent of the Wright Brothers’ first airplane”. I want one.
Light Saber Battle Re-Cap Page 4
Photo by Steve McGie
Right Honourable Frank Iacobucci and Haroon Siddiqui talk security and civil rights While 9/11 was undeniably a tragedy, a greater tragedy is that it has been used as the impetus for a string of much greater misfortunes. With the stated intention of preventing terrorism, Western governments have used the attacks on 9/11 to cloak a series of acts in legitimacy. A U.S led movement has since embarked on illegal wars abroad and infringed on the civil liberties of citizens at home. Striking a Balance between Security and Individual Rights was the topic being discussed at the Isabel Bader Theatre on November 12th, for the Association of Political Science Student’s Unions annual evening of conversation. The featured speakers were the Right Honourable Frank Iacobucci and Mr. Haroon Siddiqui. Iacobucci spoke first; his talk reflected his extensive career in the legal profession. He spoke in detail about the potential for terrorism to become “a cancer that threatens the fabric of society.” Perhaps his most poignant argument was his distinction of what actually threatens democracy: our response to terrorism as a society. One of his main concerns was that terrorism provides a cover for the government to co-opt the country’s legal framework, endangering the sustainability of an independent judiciary. Mr. Siddiqui spoke next. Anyone who is familiar with his biweekly column in the Toronto Star would know to expect his usual bold and incisive comSee 9/11 cont. pg. 2
November 22 2007 Vol. XXX No. XII
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9/11 Discussion Heats Up at Bader Theatre
November 22 2007 Vol. XXX No. XI