Sci-Tech: Totipotent stem cells derived from adult cells in new simple technique

I don’t post many items about biology but this developments sounds quite significant if it holds up:

The research will now be subject to yet more scrutiny as other teams try to replicate it. Cracks may yet appear. But right now it looks like that rarity: an actual breakthrough.

If so, the implications are huge. First and foremost, it promises an almost ridiculously simple route to regenerative medicine. There is a lot of work still to do, and many potential pitfalls before it could be applied to human patients, but in principle almost any illness caused by damaged or ageing tissue – heart disease, diabetes, Alzheimer’s and dozens of others – could be fixed this way.

That’s an exciting prospect, but as so often with stem cells, ethical concerns are lurking.