Tag: stem cells

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Whatever Happened to Stem Cells?

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stem cellsIn 1998, the stunning promise of embryonic stem cells was discovered, and it was thought that we just might be on the threshold of an age of miracles. But no miracle is a match for politics.

One day, when you are ill, when your heart finally beats a thousand times too many, when your liver is sclerotic beyond use, when your pancreas stops producing insulin, when your kidneys no longer protect you from toxins, Dr. Anthony Atala wants to heal you. In his vision, you will visit a hospital in Omaha or San Francisco or Buffalo, and a specialist will diagnose you. Then you’ll have blood taken to determine your genetic makeup, and then those results will be transmitted to an office manager in charge of a sterile white room in North Carolina that Atala has built. In a few days a small vial of stem cells that match your immunological profile perfectly will be extracted from a cryogenic tank in that room and shipped to your surgeon, who will use them to build you a new organ from scratch. It will take four to eight weeks to build and grow and implant the organ, and then you will be whole once again. Read full article.

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Embryo-like stem cells enter first human trial

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EmbryoDevelopment

It will be the first clinical study to put induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells into humans — and where more fitting than in Japan, where Shinya Yamanaka garnered a Nobel prize last December for showing how to take bodily cells and return them to an embryo-like pluripotent state.

Masayo Takahashi of the Center for Developmental Biology in Kobe just cleared the second and, observers say, most difficult hurdle in starting her iPS cell trial to treat age-related macular degeneration, a condition that affects the retina and can lead to blindness.

On Wednesday an institutional review board (IRB) at the Institute for Biomedical Research and Innovation(IBRI), which is going to sponsor the trial, gave conditional approval. The team needs now only to notify the IRB of the final results of some preclinical safety trials now underway (see story in Japanese). Read full article.

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Breakthrough in the Understanding of Embryonic Stem Cells

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ScienceDaily (Nov. 30, 2012) — A significant breakthrough in the understanding of embryonic stem cells has been made by scientists from the Smurfit Institute of Genetics at Trinity College Dublin. The Trinity research group led by Dr Adrian Bracken and funded by Science Foundation Ireland, has just published their findings in the journal, Nature Structural & Molecular Biology.

The new research describes the process whereby genes that are ‘on’ in embryonic stem cells are switched ‘off’. This process is essential in order to convert embryonic stem cells into different cell types such as neurons, blood or heart cells and therefore represents an important breakthrough in the area of regenerative medicine.

The research encompasses both embryonic stem cell research and epigenetics. Embryonic stem cell research is focused on a particular type of cell that is capable of generating the various tissues in the body; for example, muscle, heart or brain. It is particularly relevant due to its potential for regenerating diseased tissues and organs and for the treatment of a variety of conditions including Parkinson’s disease, diabetes and spinal cord injury. Read full article.

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Michigan Has Huge Hopes for Tiny Stem Cells

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Deep inside metal drums of liquid nitrogen at the University of Michigan might be the key to a replacement heart valve for 9-year-old Will Marzolf.

Or the formula for treating the Huntington’s disease that killed Krissi Putansu’s grandfather and uncle and now threatens her mother. Or the clues to protecting Marlene Goodman’s great-children from the genetics that have curled her fingers to useless angles.

Embryonic stem cell research is a fledgling science, but four years after Michigan voters lifted the ban on such research, U-M is staking its claim.

“They are promise,” Goodman said of an embryonic stem cell line known as UM11-1PGD. Read full article.

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After Cancer, Stem Cells Restore Male Fertility

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U. PITTSBURGH (US) — After an injection of banked sperm-producing stem cells, male primates who become sterile due to cancer drug side effects were once again fertile.

A study published in Cell Stem Cell, describes how previously frozen stem cells restored production of sperm that was able to successfully fertilize eggs to produce early embryos.

Some cancer drugs work by destroying rapidly dividing cells. Since it isn’t possible to discriminate between cancer cells and other rapidly dividing cells in the body, the precursor cells involved in making sperm can be inadvertently wiped out leaving the patient infertile, explains senior investigator Kyle Orwig, associate professor in the department of obstetrics, gynecology and reproductive medicine at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, and an investigator at Magee-Womens Research Institute. Read full article.

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US Scientists Aim to Make Sperm from Stem Cells

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US researchers say they will redouble their efforts to create human sperm from stem cells following the success of a Japanese study involving mice. A Kyoto University team used mice stem cells to create eggs, which were fertilised to produce baby mice.

Dr Renee Pera, of Stanford University in California, aims to create human sperm to use for reproduction within two years, and eggs within five years. Read full article.

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Nobel Prize For Medicine Awarded to Gurdon, Yamanaka for Stem Cell Discoveries

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British scientist John Gurdon and Shinya Yamanaka of Japan shared the 2012 Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine Monday for experiments separated by almost 50 years that provide deep insight into how animals develop and offer hope for a new era of personalized medicine.

“Their findings have revolutionized our understanding of how cells and organisms develop,” the Nobel committee said in the prize announcement. Read full article.

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Scientists Create Fertile Eggs from Mouse Stem Cells

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Scientists in Japan report they have created eggs from stem cells in a mammal for the first time. And the researchers went on to breed healthy offspring from the eggs they created.

While the experiments involved mice, the work is being met with excitement — and questions — about doing the same thing for humans someday.

“Wow. That’s my general reaction,” said Hank Greely, a bioethicist at Stanford University who studies stem-cell science. “Repairing hearts, repairing brains, repairing kidneys, that’s all good and important, and we’d all love to be able to do that. But this involves making the next generation.” Read full article.

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Stem Cells: A Culture War Gone Quiet

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While a draft plank in the Republican Party’s platform supporting a constitutional amendment banning abortion has gotten plenty of attention, so far unnoticed is another culture war provision tucked right alongside it — an opposition to federal funding for embryonic stem cell research. “We oppose the killing of embryos for their stem cells. We oppose Federal funding of embryonic stem cell research,” the draft language reads, mirroring previous years’ platforms. You’d be forgiven for having déjà vu from 2004, when stem cell research was at the top of the agenda of both parties and sparked fierce and emotional debate. It’s completely vanished from the political scene since — what happened? Read full article.

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U-M registers six new embryonic stem cell lines

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The genetic mutation responsible for a blood clotting disorder known as hemophilia B is among two embryonic stem cell lines created by the University of Michigan and believed to be the first in the world to carry the disease, officials announced Thursday.

The two stem cell lines are among six new lines created by U-M and added to the national registry, bringing the total number of lines the university has created to eight.

The lines are available for federally funded research by scientists across the country to study the origin and potential treatments for diseases such as Huntington’s disease, a fatal brain disorder, and a heart condition known as hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, which causes sudden death in athletes and others.

“Our last three years of work have really begun to pay off, paving the way for scientists worldwide to make novel discoveries that will benefit human health in the near future,” says Gary Smith, Ph.D., who derived the lines and also is co-director of the U-M Consortium for Stem Cell Therapies, part of the A. Alfred Taubman Medical Research Institute.

Read full article.