Abstract
Purpose of review
To summarize and clarify the main ethical issues surrounding the generation and use of human-animal chimeras in stem cell research.
Recent findings
US federal funding remains restricted for certain forms of human-animal chimera research despite the widespread promulgation and acceptance of national and international stem cell-specific research guidelines.
Summary
Stem cell-based human-animal chimera research can promote advances in basic human developmental biology, disease modeling, and new drug discoveries. National and international guidelines for this form of stem cell research have been developed over the past several years but ethical concerns persist around human dignity and the possible moral humanization of chimeric animals. These concerns can be defused and ought to be replaced with a more tractable focus on animal welfare.
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References
Papers of particular interest, published recently, have been highlighted as: • Of importance
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Dr. Insoo Hyun reports no conflicts of interest.
Human and Animal Rights and Informed Consent
This article does not contain any studies with human or animal subjects performed by any of the authors.
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This article is part of the Topical Collection on Ethics in Stem/Progenitor Cell Therapeutics
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Hyun, I. The Ethics of Chimera Creation in Stem Cell Research. Curr Stem Cell Rep 4, 235–239 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40778-018-0136-6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40778-018-0136-6