Stem Cells
UCLA scientists have reprogrammed human skin cells into cells with the same unlimited properties as embryonic stem cells. The process doesn't use human eggs or destroy human embryos, so you may not have heard of it.
The bioethics issues concerning engineering cells from embryos is circumnavigated with this 
breakthrough. We may now get to the merits of what "good" can come of pursuing this type of reseach.
The reprogrammed cells, known as "induced pluripotent stem cells," genetically matched to the donor, can be used to grow tissues for future use in tissue replacement therapies, including a range of things from regeneration of damaged heart tissue to Parkinson's to spinal-cord injury.
The discovery potentially provides a virtually unlimited supply of embryonic stem cells without the moral baggage of or need to use human embryos, cloning or human eggs. It also takes such research out of the political arena back into the realm of science where it belongs.
