Received this email today:

Marius Wernig and Alexander Meissner from the Jaenisch lab are tentatively scheduled to appear tonight on the NBC Nightly News at 6:30 pm (Channel 7 in the greater Boston area). Due to the unpredictability of network news, the segment could be rescheduled at the last minute for another night.

Wernig and Meissner will discuss today's groundbreaking Nature paper that describes taking mouse fibroblasts (a kind of cell that gives rise to connective tissue) and, through genetic manipulation, turning them into cells that resemble embryonic stem cells in every way that can be tested.

Although this work has been done in mice, scientists are optimistic that these findings will translate to human cells and one day enable researchers to create embryonic stem cells without utilizing an egg or embryo.