If Nick Schapiro gets his way, scientists will find a cure for diabetes by the time he graduates from college. The lanky, brown-eyed 16-year-old dreams four or five times a day about life as a diabetes-free adult or "every time I give myself a shot." Fueling his hopes: controversial news that an internationally known Norfolk clinic has created a source of embryonic stem cells for research, thought to be a vital key in curing debilitating medical conditions and diseases like diabetes. "It seems like we’re so close to a cure," says Nick, who lobbied Virginia congressional members to support federal funding for embryonic stem cell research. "I think it’s real."

Nick Schapiro, 16, suffers from diabetes and believes that stem cell research could one day cure his disease. Photo by Mark Rhodes

Last month’s announcement by scientists at Eastern Virginia Medical School’s Jones Institute for Reproductive Medicine is significant because it creates another source of stem cells, used for research to grow new tissue, repair damaged organs, or create insulin-producing cells. But the Jones Institute development triggered a firestorm: the Jones stem cell lines came from human embryos created specifically for research from donated sperm and eggs – not from frozen embryos left over from in-vitro fertilization procedures, as is usually the case. Because embryos die when stem cells are extracted, the Jones work propelled Virginia center stage into a debate raging from Hollywood to the Vatican, from the White House to the water cooler. How far should science go to unlock the most elusive secrets of human life?

For Nick and others suffering from Parkinson’s disease, heart trouble, even spinal cord injuries, the findings at Jones and other labs worldwide capture the power and promise of rapidly evolving stem cell research. "It’s a breakthrough. It’s a big deal," says Dr. Brandon Price, chairman-elect of the Virginia Biotechnology Association. "Any scientist interested in how human organisms grow and develop, and the genetic implications, is excited by this research."

Not everyone shares Price’s enthusiasm, however. A new policy from President George W. Bush allows limited federal funding for embryonic stem cell research, using existing stem cell lines that were developed from embryos destined to be discarded. The president’s direct criticism of the Jones work — for creating embryos specifically for research — excludes the Virginia lab’s stem cells from any federally funded research.

Congress spent the summer debating the scope of federal stem cell funding and legislation banning cloning. The political heat is sending a few researchers packing to continue their work in less-regulated countries. In Virginia, abortion foes upset that embryos die when the cells are extracted, protested outside the Jones clinic. Gov. Jim Gilmore dispatched a Cabinet secretary to Norfolk to ensure that none of the $14.1 million that EVMS receives from the state funds the clinic’s stem cell research. School officials assured the governor’s office that no public funds are involved in the work.

State lawmakers, who have the power to stop or limit embryonic stem cell research, are considering the implications. "Harvesting embryos even for the laudable purpose of treating systemic and chronic disease just strikes me as the morally inappropriate thing to do," says Virginia Beach Delegate Robert McDonnell, sponsor of Virginia’s new law that bans human cloning. "While they (Jones Institute) have pioneered this technique, we need to be cautious about implementing it on a large-scale basis." The research is even an issue in the governor’s race. Democrat Mark Warner, whose daughter has diabetes, supports research on discarded embryos but opposes public funding for research that creates embryos for study. Republican Mark Earley says the days-old embryos are a form of human life and should not be used for research.

While politicians and the public debate, scientists are boring in on a practical question that also holds a key to the commercial potential: are embryonic stem cells more effective for lab work than those harvested from adults? A National Institutes of Health report finds promise with both adult and embryonic stem cell research, but believes embryonic stem cells may be more pliable. Still, the NIH urges more work in both areas. In Virginia, scientists are plowing ahead on both fronts — proof of what biotech booster Price views as growing "evidence of all the research that is going on in this state."

Finding new sources of stem cells will determine the commercial stakes. Bush’s limited federal funding is encouraging more Virginia labs — both academic and commercial — to consider embryonic stem cell work. Privately funded studies like the Jones Institute also will continue research. Nationally, just a few entities have been major players so far; for-profit labs estimate that the private sector is spending $10 million to $15 million a year on embryonic stem cell research. California’s Geron Corp. holds a range of patents for embryonic stem cell work and has exclusive commercial arrangements with labs at the University of Wisconsin and Johns Hopkins University.

From there, the marketplace may still decide which ailments rate the most attention. Advocates who wanted a broader policy on federal funding believe that cures might come faster with more scientists working in the field. "(Full) federal funding would allow scientists to investigate science on scientific and intellectual ground. If (research) is privately financed, it’s done with a commercial goal in mind," notes Sean Tipton, spokesman for the American Society for Reproductive Medicine, whose journal published an article on the Jones Institute stem cell research.

Jones Institute scientists applaud even the limited federal aid as help for other researchers and hope to push ahead on their own stem cell research for treatments and cures. Others, like the University of Virginia’s Dr. Adam Katz, are deliberately looking at alternative stem cell sources. Katz, a former University of Pittsburgh plastic surgeon who just arrived in Charlottesville, uses fat collected from liposuction in his research to grow new bone, cartilage and tissue. His work could help doctors one day rebuild breasts after mastectomies or speed repair of bone fractures. "There will not be one particular source of stem cells that’s best for all problems," he says.

A team at the McGuire Veterans Administration Medical Center in Richmond is studying adult neural stem cells — and how the brain can make new neurons — as part of a Parkinson’s disease project. "Fetal and embryonic stem cell work is a stepping stone," says Dr. Kathryn Holloway, a neurosurgeon at Virginia Commonwealth University’s Medical College of Virginia. "We’re going to move on from there." In Blacksburg, scientists at the U.S. subsidiary of PPL Therapeutics, the Scottish firm that helped clone Dolly the sheep, can transform skin cells from cattle into stem cells, then make them heart cells.

Amid the flurry of news, researchers urge caution. Some scientists say treatments or cures from stem cell research may be at least 10 years away. The University of Virginia’s Katz gets a laugh talking about his work with fat cells - "it’s in large supply and nobody wants it" - but turns serious when he looks ahead. "The initial science has broken the barriers of classical teaching, but there’s no question that we don’t want to oversell this to the public."

Few know that better than Quincy Dedes, a paraplegic injured in a 1974 car accident. She wrote letters nearly 10 years ago to encourage research in Virginia after scientists talked of using stem cells to repair damaged spinal cords. "I wonder where the time went," says Dedes — still hopeful that one day, she can send the injured she counsels to a Virginia hospital for treatment. Scientists say spinal cord repair poses a thorny set of problems they hope to solve through future stem cell research — a project Holloway wants funded here. "A lot of work needs to be done. We have to learn how to make the cells do what we want them to do," she says.

No matter, most agree that it’s an awesome time in science, to be able to hold out hope for Nick Schapiro, Quincy Dedes and millions of others whose lives might one day benefit from a group of cells small enough to fit on the head of a pin. Dr. Thomas F. Huff, Virginia Commonwealth University’s vice provost for life sciences, likens it to the "Golden Age of bacteriology" in the late 1800s, when scientists enjoyed a series of rapid breakthroughs in treating typhoid, cholera and diphtheria. "Today it’s a kind of ‘Golden Age’ in the opportunities before us."