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Nature 439, 658-659 (9 February 2006) | doi:10.1038/439658a; Published online 8 February 2006

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No end in sight for stem-cell odyssey

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Advanced Cell Technology plans to tread cautiously on the ground left vacant by the collapse of a South Korean scientist's claims to have cloned a human embryo, as David Cyranoski reports.

Little more than two years ago, one of the research teams considered most likely to clone a human embryo was at Advanced Cell Technology (ACT), a small biotechnology company in Worcester, Massachusetts.ACT — a company whose rocky history had already carried it from work on cloning farm animals into human embryonic stem-cell research — had created cloned early-stage human embryos, called morulae.