http://content.usatoday.com/communities/sciencefair/post/2010/04/human-stem-cell-survival-hinges-on-surface-proteins/1

A pair of chemicals make human embryonic stem cells survive the "massive cell death" that often frustrates researchers, a Monday study finds.

In the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, a team led by Yue Xua of the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, Calif., finds "two small molecules that enhance the survival of human embryonic stem cells."

Human embryonic stem cells are the precursors to specific organ tissues in the adult body. Since 1998, when a University of Wisconsin team first isolated human embryonic stem cells, biomedical researchers have looked to the cells to screen drugs, investigate organ development and perhaps, provide rejection-free transplant tissues for patients suffering ailments such as diabetes and paralysis. The human embryo-destroying research garnered controversy, resulting in President George Bush's restricted approval of federal research funding to already existing cell lines in 2001, a policy overturned last year.

The pair of cell survival compounds, called "thiazole" and "pyrimidine", keep the fragile cells alive by preventing damage to a substance on the surface of the cells that keeps them attached to growth gels, after they have been removed from an embryo. The team showed that dosing the cells with the compounds greatly improves their survival, which should ease research on human stem cells.

Apr 12, 2010, USA Today