[Dignity of human beings as regulatory principle in bioethics]

New discoveries and advances in biotechnology are producing new social realities which must be appraised properly from the ethical point of view. Vitally important in this task is the principle of human dignity, which is examined here by the author. Human dignity is crucial in seeking to resolve the conflicts that might arise as a result of the new possibilities opened up by modern biotechnology, such as embryo research, predictive diagnosis, gene therapy, human cloning or the issue of xenotransplants.