Science by press release — PrimeGen’s murky stem-cell “breakthrough”

Last week, the Irvine, Calif., startup PrimeGen Biotech made a startling claim: It had successfully transformed adult skin, kidney and retina cells into stem cells, without using viral gene therapy that could trigger cancer. That would represent a significant advance over the discovery last year (see our coverage) that inserting just four genes into ordinary cells could reawaken their ability to transform themselves into any type of tissue, potentially opening the door to regenerative medicine that doesn't rely on stem cells derived from five-day-old embryos.

But there's no shortage of reasons to treat PrimeGen's claims with skepticism, starting with the fact that it chose to announce them at last week's Stem Cell Summit, an investment conference in New York whose Web site already seems to be defunct. Add in the facts that PrimeGen has been making similar claims for more than two years but hasn't ever published its findings in a scientific journal, that it only seems to present actual data at obscure overseas meetings - on organized by the Pontifical Academy for Life and the World Federation...