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I just wrote a piece about stem cells, and I’d like to take a moment to talk about one of the things I briefly mention in the article: teratomas, which, like most of the best things in medicine, are both intellectually fascinating and spectacularly gross. (For the sake of the squeamish, I’m not including any pictures except the one at left [apparently her name is "Tabitha"], but there is a disgusting one here.)
Teratomas are essentially tumors made of cells that have decided to differentiate into any old thing — teeth, hair, fat. That goes a long way toward explaining their name, which comes from the root word for “monster” (as those of you who participated in our coin-a-new-word contest will know). Normally they tend to arise in the ovaries, testes, and sacra — but in experiments, they also seem to turn up where scientists implant embryonic stem cells. You may know them from season 2 of Grey’s Anatomy, in which a man thinks he is pregnant a la Arnold Schwarzenegger but turns out to be carrying a large teratoma instead. But what interests me most about them (at present, anyway) is their relationship with the aforementioned stem cells. Yes, they present a problem for embryonic research. But they might end up providing a solution to that very same problem:
As clusters of human cells that are not independent organisms, teratomas may prove better test subjects for drugs than lab animals, and they are inspiring ways to grow stem cells without harvesting embryos. …
Teratomas’ most fascinating quality, Dr. Skorecki said, is their capacity to generate a smorgasbord of human tissue varieties, including bones, skin and ligaments. As a result, researchers testing a new medicine on a cancer-seeded teratoma can gauge what effects the drug will have on different cell types without enlisting human subjects. …
Like ordinary embryos, the tumors produce stem cells that have the potential to develop into hundreds of tissue types — raw material researchers may need to treat diseases like Alzheimer’s.
PS: My husband says I’ve written the plural of teratoma incorrectly and that it should be “teratomata.” Well, you say tera-tomata, I say tera-tomahta…
Comments (13)
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I wonder if there could be some way to choose what form it takes. You could replace lost teeth with real teeth.
Lost organs, muscle, etc.
posted by Sheldon Siegel on 1-10-2007 at 1:56 pm
My daughter was born with a “sacreal cochageal teratoma” (sorry, too lazy to check spelling) a tumor that formed on her tailbone. When the doctor removed it (it was almost as big as her head) he also removed the last segment of tailbone to prevent reoccurence. What he told me about these out of control stem cells makes me very skeptical about the usefulness of any stem cells to repair the body. How are you going to control them? By the way, my daughter is fine now.
posted by Pamala on 1-10-2007 at 5:42 pm
I hope my appetite returns by lunch. Thank you for putting that as a link and not on the front page (although a stronger warning may be needed because I have a cast iron stomach and even I turned a little green.)
posted by Cathy on 1-11-2007 at 8:12 am
While I agree with everything that was said in this article, it may be important to note that teratomas are composed mostly of cells that already made their “fate”decisions. They’re pretty much done growing and getting even more gross. Teratocarcinomas (even worse than teratomas) still have a significant population of stem cells in them. Keep an eye on the field! These little guys, once out of the tumor can be fairly tame. Think, Lion in the tumor, and pussycat in the cell culture dishes. But a word of caution, even pussycats can scratch.
PS: Love the doll. You should market it and sell it.
posted by Joe Carp on 1-12-2007 at 7:30 pm
thanks God I saw the article AFTER lunch. And me being as curious as I am, had to google it for IMAGES !!! that was really gross especially on infants… DON’T GOOGLE IT !!, you have been warned
posted by Fign on 1-8-2008 at 7:43 am
Oh come on guys. I know it would be terrible for oneself or someone you know to have, but it wasn’t that stomach-turning.
Toughen up, kids!
posted by Sarah on 1-8-2008 at 8:32 am
Yeah! I don’t have a cast-iron stomach, and the images didn’t traumatize me! Take it like a man!
posted by Pearl on 1-8-2008 at 9:56 am
My father was a pathologist and these, along with ovarian cysts, were the only two things that made him gag!
posted by Heather on 1-8-2008 at 4:26 pm
I once saw a special on the Discover Health Channel about a boy from a small Central American village who had a teratoma removed which was a very deformed fetuslike mass – the doctors couldn’t really agree if it was a true teratoma or a sort of parasitic twin which had grown inside him.
Also, wouldn’t the plural be teratomae? I took 8 years of Latin… but maybe the declining of medical terms if different than regular nouns?
posted by Joy on 1-8-2008 at 8:15 pm
* that should have read “Discovery”, not Discover
posted by Joy on 1-8-2008 at 8:19 pm
It’s not Latin, it’s Greek. Stigma plural is stigmata.
posted by Barbara on 1-8-2008 at 9:11 pm
The plural would be teratomata
posted by Cyndi on 1-9-2008 at 9:19 am
I had a saccrogeal teratoma. I am a 48 yr old female who discovered the mass at the base of tailbone while radiologists were searching for an errant kidney stone. coccyx was excised, major infection (MRSA) req’ing 3600mg of Clindamyacin daily for 8 wks and last, but certainly not least…have finally lowered my daily dosage of Morhphine for the tailbone pain to 160mg per day. O-U-C-H, my friends, the tailbone is quite the issue. My feelings after discovering I had an identical twin?? I’m certainly relieved we weren’t conjoined-1st, and second, what is-is what it is. I’ve done fine without my ‘womb-mate’ thus far…I’ll get through.
posted by Tracy on 9-17-2009 at 12:11 pm