Louisiana residents who fear their state may one day be taken over by a superior race of human grizzly bear hybrids can now rest at ease.Senate Bill 115 — which was signed by Gov. Bobby Jindal late last month — makes it unlawful for, “any person to knowingly create a human-animal hybrid.” Sen. Daniel Martiny, R – Metairie, presented the legislation at request of the Archbishop of New Orleans, Martiny said.”There was a lot of confusion over this bill,” said Rob Tasman, associate director of Louisiana Conference of Catholic Bishops. “A lot of people are like ‘what are these guys doing? They want to ban the creation of centaurs or duckboys or whatever.’ Really it was never about that. It was always about the serious issue of how [human animal hybrids] play into stem cell research.”The bill defines a human-animal hybrid as, “A human embryo into which a nonhuman cell or cells or the component parts thereof have been introduced or a nonhuman embryo into which a human cell or cells or the component parts thereof have been introduced.”Tasman said the Catholic church condemns the practice of human-animal hybrid research because it degrades human dignity.”The danger is that you are going to have an unethical blending of species which detracts from the dignity of human life and the high regard in which the church holds human life itself,” Tasman said. “It’s a confusion of the two in a way that is immoral and unethical.”Jeffrey Gimble, a professor in the stem cell biology laboratory at Pennington Biomedical Research Center, said the ethical discussion around the bill comes back to the polarizing questions about how religion and society define human life, and said the new law has a damaging effect on science in Louisiana.”We have a precedent in our body of law saying that if it destroys human embryos that is a criminal act that requires up to 10 years in prison and a million dollar fine,” Gimble said. “I think the more laws you have in a state that make those kind of statements about what will happen to scientists who conduct science that is not condoned in that particular state is having an impact on the ability to build science and infrastructure around science in that environment.”The bill states that violators could be fined up to $10,000 and sentenced to hard labor for up to 10 years.John Larkin, University genetics professor, said while he doesn’t disagree with the research when it is done in an ethic manner, scientists must respect the religious beliefs of the public.”I don’t personally have a problem with research done with careful oversight from ethics committees that was aimed at disease therapies in a thoughtful way,” Larkin said in an email. “It is important that scientists interested in doing research that might benefit human health respect the beliefs of the public and seek to balance the possible benefits with the overall comfort of society at large with the ethical issues.”British news agencies reported in January 2008 that regulators in the United Kingdom had given scientists permission to conduct research on human-animal hybrid embryos. Extracting stem cells from the hybrid embryos then destroying the embryos was the goal of the research, according to the reports.”One of the big criticisms with the bill was that, ‘This is silly, no one is doing it,'” Martiny said. “The whole purpose of the bill was to make sure no one did it because once someone starts to do it, you have to do something to correct it.”Martiny said there had been no precedent for human-animal hybrid embryo research in the United States, but the introduction of the bill was prompted by news the United Kingdom had passed legislation that funded the practice.”I am not familiar with any other state that has those criminal acts around scientific conduct,” Gimble said. “I think that by being here we are automatically at a disadvantage to states like California because their laws are not restricting all forms of stem cell research. And that is going to impact our ability to attract national funding for science on several levels.”—-Contact Xerxes A. Wilson at [email protected]