Opponents of embryonic stem cell research, which involves destroying the donated embryos from which cell lines are derived, have long argued that the discovery of iPS cells in 2006 (for which Shinya Yamanaka was awarded the Nobel Prize in Medicine this past year) obviates the need for embryonic stem cell research.

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The NIH says it will be meeting with the University of Wisconsin group that holds a patent on five stem cell lines its scientists derived.

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They derived the actual stem-cell lines for each of these patients, nine of the 11 patients.

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But some food companies are using cell lines that were originally derived from human fetuses in order to develop new food products.

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The authors of the PLoS Biology report claimed that iPS cell lines can create live, iPS derived mice that survive into adulthood.

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Scientists found however, that feeder cells and serums derived from other animal cells introduced disease-causing agents that compromised the quality of the cell lines.

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