

Acid-bath stem-cell study under investigation - dfjorque
http://www.nature.com/news/acid-bath-stem-cell-study-under-investigation-1.14738

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timtadh
My wife works in cell biology and worked with stem cells for the last several
years. Differentiation protocols are very difficult. She was working on
turning IPS cells into lung epithelial cells so she could study the effects of
CFTR malfunction with genetically matched control cells.

The differentiation protocol she was trying to replicate is several month long
protocol. Because each cell line has unique properties protocols must be
"optimized" for each line before it will work. She ended up switching to
primary lung epithelial cells for her experiments because the differentiation
protocol was too difficult to replicate.

I guess my point is cell biology is very tricky and stem cell biology seems
(from an outside perspective) to be even trickier. However, that isn't a
reason not to be sceptical -- it just means it may take some time to really
answer the question of whether or not this acid bath protocol works.

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Fomite
This was my thought. So far 10 attempts to replicate it failing isn't a _good_
sign, but I'm willing to bet, based on my track record when I did wet lab
research, that the lab that produced the study (if indeed it is correct)
failed more than 10 times.

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dfjorque
Article about the study: [http://www.nature.com/news/acid-bath-offers-easy-
path-to-ste...](http://www.nature.com/news/acid-bath-offers-easy-path-to-stem-
cells-1.14600)

HN thread:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7143630](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7143630)

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gerbal
Good, any incredible result should be doubted until it can be replicated.

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dekhn
What about credible results- should things require less evidence if they
support the status quo?

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XorNot
The status quo by definition has a lot of support in scientific literature.
Sure, you could right a botched paper supporting it, but people would
basically ignore it because it would be a bad paper (though a peer reviewer
would likely tear it to shreds anyway).

~~~
lutusp
> The status quo by definition has a lot of support in scientific literature.

Not really. Science is by its very nature subversive, and as many Nobels have
been awarded for work that falsified the status quo as confirmed it.

When the Michelson-Morley experiment falsified the luminiferous ether, much of
physics fell into limbo (without a credible "status quo"), until Einstein's
relativity theory offered an alternative explanation for electromagnetic
propagation. But Einstein's proposal was met with incredulity until very good
evidence confirmed it. That's science at its best -- perpetual doubt and
skepticism.

~~~
XorNot
I think we're using two different definitions of "status quo". Science most
definitely has a status quo - that's the established theoretical basis for
various fields.

That of course can be very different to the cultural status quo.

~~~
lutusp
> Science most definitely has a status quo - that's the established
> theoretical basis for various fields.

Yes, that's true, but to call a falsifiable theory a status quo is to imply
that it represents an anchor, a stabilizing influence, rather than a tempting
moving target for skeptical scientists, its true role.

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alex-g
I don't know a lot about biology, but I do know a lot about proofs,
provenance, zero-knowledge, etc. I wonder if there is some way, in an
experiment of this kind, to tell whether the embryonic stem cells obtained are
"really" derived from an adult mouse, as opposed to being extracted from an
ordinary mouse embryo. In that case, third parties could verify the claim just
by looking at the cell cultures. But I assume that they are actually
completely normal-looking, as this is the point of the protocol.

Otherwise, perhaps it is possible for the provenance to be deliberately marked
in some way that is resistant to forgery. For example, the adult cells used
could be provided by some independent source who is generally trusted not to
"leak" the corresponding embryonic cells. Then, if you produce ESCs with the
right genome (which is easy to test), you must have done it using adult cells
alone. If a clever and unscrupulous biologist could forge that - say by taking
a normal ESC and injecting foreign genetic material, or by cloning the mouse
and harvesting the new embryo - then perhaps some alternative marker could be
devised. It would have to be something that could be introduced into the adult
mouse cells, but couldn't be easily extracted, swamped by a new marker, or
transferred in the cloning process. Or we could cross-check against other
signs that those methods might have been used - some biological equivalent of
tamper-evidence, maybe?

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jmount
Not a biologist or chemist (but have worked a lot of them). I was very
suspicious of "acid bath" being a secret sauce. Chemists and biologists always
work through PH range studies early and often. It is one of the things that is
very easy to control and measure, so they all hope it will have a useful
effect (and check for it).

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throwaway_yy2Di
Suspicious images: [http://blog.goo.ne.jp/lemon-
stoism/e/008ac025ee1ccf4c694869f...](http://blog.goo.ne.jp/lemon-
stoism/e/008ac025ee1ccf4c694869f09b053ee7)

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charlieflowers
Huh. I've always thought all placentas look alike.

