The first reports of the successful reprogramming of adult human cells back into so-called induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells, which by all appearances looked and acted liked embryonic stem cells created a media stir. But the process was woefully inefficient: Only one out of 10,000 cells could be persuaded to turn back the clock.
Stem cells are emerging as a key issue in many political races. But to cast an educated vote on stem cells, voters must understand a complex, fast-emerging new field of medicine - no easy task. To help, U-M scientists offer five key things they feel everyone should know about stem cells.
In a groundbreaking study led by an eminent molecular biologist at Florida State University, researchers have discovered that as embryonic stem cells turn into different cell types, there are dramatic corresponding changes to the order in which DNA is replicated and reorganized.
The majority of infertility patients are in favor of using left-over embryos for stem cell research and would also support selling left-over embryos to other couples, according to a survey conducted by UIC's Dr. Tarun Jain.
The WiCell Research Institute, a private, not-for-profit supporting organization to the University of Wisconsin-Madison, is launching its own stem cell bank to distribute cell lines beyond the 21 lines eligible for federal funding and distribution through the National Stem Cell Bank (NSCB).
Researchers within the University of Adelaide's new Centre for Stem Cell Research are aiming by the end of this year to show repair in stroke-damaged brains using stem cells taken from adult teeth.
Researchers have shown that immune-defense cells influenced by embryonic stem cell-derived cells can help prevent the rejection of hearts transplanted into mice, all without the use of immunosuppressive drugs.
Mayo Clinic investigators have demonstrated that stem cells can be used to regenerate heart tissue to treat dilated cardiomyopathy, a congenital defect. Publication of the discovery was expedited by the editors of Stem Cells and appeared online in the "express" section of the journal's Web site at http://stemcells.alphamedpress.org/.
Using the molecular equivalent of a tattoo on DNA that adult stem cells (ASC) pass to their "daughter" cells in combination with gene expression profiles, University of Utah researchers have identified two early steps in adult stem cell differentiation"”the process that determines whether cells will form muscle, neurons, skin, etc., in people and animals.
In light of a recent breakthrough study in adult stem cell research published in Nature, a group of the world's leading researchers, the International Society for Stem Cell Research (ISSCR), cautions against discounting the potential benefits of all forms of stem cell research, adult and embryonic alike.
Johns Hopkins researchers have discovered the earliest form of human blood stem cells and deciphered the mechanism by which these embryonic stem cells replicate and grow. They also found a surprising biological marker that pinpoints these stem cells, which serve as the progenitors for red blood cells and lymphocytes.
Medulloblastoma, an aggressive childhood brain tumor, originates in normal brain "stem" cells that turn malignant when acted on by a known mutant oncogene, say Dana-Farber and the University of California, San Francisco researchers. The findings suggest that not all tumors may be born from the same cells.
Researchers from the Harvard Stem Cell Institute and Stem Cell Program at Children's Hospital Boston have produced a robust new collection of disease-specific stem cell lines, all of which were developed using the new induced pluripotent stem cell (iPS) technique.
Short snippets of RNA called microRNAs help to keep embryonic stem cells in their stem cell state. Researchers now have discovered the gene circuitry that controls microRNAs in embryonic stem cells. Mapping the control circuitry of stem cells reveals how they maintain themselves or decide to differentiate, providing key clues for regenerative medicine and reprogramming of adult cells to a stem cell state. These maps also aid our understanding of human development and diseases such as cancer.
Embryonic-like stem cells can be efficiently generated using a natural signaling molecule instead of the virally delivered cancer-causing gene c-Myc. The results represent progress in overcoming hurdles to the potential use of reprogrammed cells for stem-cell-based therapies in humans.
Less than 27 months after announcing that he had institutional permission to attempt the creation of patient and disease-specific stem cell lines, Harvard Stem Cell Institute (HSCI) Principal Faculty member Kevin Eggan today proclaimed the effort a success.
Researchers at Johns Hopkins have discovered that the Notch protein helps human embryonic stem cells "decide" their own fate, a finding which may eventually be useful in programming cells for the development of stem cell therapies. Their results are reported in the May 2008 issue of Cell Stem Cell.
Logic says it has to be the niche. As air and water preceded life, so the niche, that hospitable environment that shelters adult stem cells in many tissues and provides factors necessary to keep them young and vital, must have emerged before its stem cell dependents.
Researchers at the Joslin Diabetes Center have demonstrated for the first time that transplanted muscle stem cells can both improve muscle function in animals with a form of muscular dystrophy and replenish the stem cell population for use in the repair of future muscle injuries.
Kansas State University researchers are working on a method of delivering cancer drugs that promises to be more efficient and reduce the side effects patients have to deal with.
A gene that is overexpressed in 20 percent of breast cancers increases the number of cancer stem cells, the cells that fuel a tumor's growth and spread, according to a new study from the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center.
Researchers have shown that they can put mouse embryonic stem cells to work building the heart, potentially moving medical science a significant step closer to a new generation of heart disease treatments that use human stem cells.
In recent years, stem cell researchers have become very adept at manipulating the fate of adult stem cells cultured in the lab. Now, researchers at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies achieved the same feat with adult neural stem cells still in place in the brain. They successfully coaxed mouse brain stem cells bound to join the neuronal network to differentiate into support cells instead.
Burnham Scientists have genetically programmed embryonic stem cells to become nerve cells when transplanted into the brain. The research, an important step toward developing new treatments for stroke, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and other neurological conditions showed that mice afflicted by stroke showed tangible therapeutic improvement following transplantation of these cells.
Researchers at Children's Hospital Boston have pinpointed a new, previously unrecognized group of stem cells that give rise to cardiomyocytes, or heart muscle cells. These stem cells, located in the surface of the heart, or epicardium, advance the hope of being able to regenerate injured heart tissue. This study will be published online by Nature on June 22.
Researchers found that the activation of a molecular pathway important in stem cell and developmental biology leads to an increase in lung stem cells. Harnessing this knowledge could help develop therapies for lung-tissue repair after injury or disease.
In an approach that could become a new treatment for the 10 to 20 percent of people whose broken bones fail to heal, researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill have shown that transplantation of adult stem cells can improve healing of fractures.
Adult stem cells improve healing of broken bones and could eventually serve as a new treatment for the 10 to 20 percent of fractures that fail to heal, according to a new study. The results will be presented Monday, June 16, at The Endocrine Society's 90th Annual Meeting in San Francisco, by Froilan Granero-Molto, PhD, research associate of the University of North Carolina.
Inspired by a chance discovery during another experiment, researchers at UT Southwestern Medical Center have created a small molecule that stimulates nerve stem cells to begin maturing into nerve cells in culture.
At the sixth annual meeting of the International Society for Stem Cell Research, a task force of leaders in the field announced a draft set of guidelines to ensure that rigorous best practices are applied to the clinical translation of stem cell research from the laboratory to human subjects.
A single organ may contain more than one type of adult stem cell "“ a discovery that complicates prospects for using the versatile cells to replace damaged tissue as a treatment for disease, according to a new study from the laboratory of geneticist Mario Capecchi, the University of Utah's Nobel Laureate.
When forming attitudes about embryonic stem cell research, people are influenced by a number of things. But understanding science plays a negligible role for many people.
Bolstered by supportive policies and public research dollars, the United Kingdom, Israel, China, Singapore and Australia are producing unusually large shares of human embryonic stem cell research. While states like California and New York are picking up more research funding in the U.S.
Using a novel investigatory technique, researchers at the Joslin Diabetes Center have established that osteoblasts, cells responsible for bone formation, are also directly involved in the proliferation and expansion of blood-forming hematopoietic stem cells.
Research from the University of Southern California (USC) has discovered a new mechanism to allow embryonic stem cells to divide indefinitely and remain undifferentiated. The study, which was published in today's issue of the journal Nature, also reveals how embryonic stem cell multiplication is regulated, which may be important in understanding how to control tumor cell growth.
It's usually assumed that stem cells differentiate via a set of "instructions" and prescribed pathways. However, new research shows that the decision is made collectively by an entire network of genes and proteins -- through a simple, elegant system that maintains cells in a stable state, yet enables them to differentiate as needed. It also suggests a more efficient way of differentiating stem cells in the lab.
Cells that undergo an epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition (EMT) show properties of stem cells, including the ability to self-renew. In addition, stem cells exhibit properties of cells that undergo EMT. Strikingly, both normal and cancer stem cells can be generated from differentiated cells by EMT. Understanding the role of EMT in adult stem cell creation may lead toward the development of healthy stem cells for regenerative medicine and provide drug targets for cancer.
California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) announced a nearly $27 million award to USC to help fund its new stem cell building.
A study led by a researcher at the University of Southern California has found a new model to explain how signals between cells in the embryo control limb development.
Stem cell researchers at UCLA were able to grow functioning cardiac cells using mouse skin cells that had been reprogrammed into cells with the same unlimited properties as embryonic stem cells.
Fully differentiated mouse cells, such as mature B cells, can be reprogrammed to embryonic-stem-cell-like induced pluripotent stem (IPS) cells, without the use of an egg. Using reprogrammed mature B cells, researchers may be able to create mouse models that will aid in understanding autoimmune diseases such as multiple sclerosis and type 1 diabetes.
Preliminary data from one of the first clinical trials to test a stem cell-targeting drug in cancer patients shows that while the drug did not prolong survival, its suppressing effect on patients' stem cells was impressive enough to send investigators looking for a better drug to try.
Researchers at UT Southwestern Medical Center have for the first time used drug-treated blood stem cells to repair heart damage in an animal model, results that might point to methods for healing injuries from heart attacks or disease.
New research shows that delivering molecules within aggregates of embryonic stem cells via biodegradable microspheres enhances the efficiency and purity of differentiation.
Researchers at the Joslin Diabetes Center have identified a gene that is responsible for the division and movement of marrow-derived, blood-forming stem cells, a finding that could have major implications for the future of bone marrow and blood cell transplantation.
By revealing the inner workings of a common cell-to-cell signaling system, University of Michigan biologists have uncovered new clues about mysterious and contentious creatures called cancer stem cells.
Researchers at Johns Hopkins have uncovered the molecular underpinnings of one of the earliest steps in human development using human embryonic stem cells. Their identification of a critical signal mediated by the protein BMP-4 that drives the differentiation of stem cells into what will become the placenta, will be published in the April issue of Cell Stem Cell.
A unique partnership between industry and academia has led to human clinical trials of a new drug for a rare class of blood diseases called myeloproliferative disorders (MPD), which are all driven by the same genetic mutation and can evolve into leukemia.
For a rich source of stem cells to be engineered into new blood vessels or skin tissue, clinicians may one day look no further than the hair on their patients' heads, according to new research published earlier this month by University at Buffalo engineers.
Stem cell researchers from UCLA used a high resolution technique to examine the genome, or total DNA content, of a pair of human embryonic stem cell lines and found that while both lines could form neurons, the lines had differences in the numbers of certain genes that could control such things as individual traits and disease susceptibility.
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