Effort to Build Artificial Testicle Awarded NIH Grant
Turek ClinicA proposal to construct an artificial human testicle and research how human sperm are made from stem cells received a grant from the NIH.
A proposal to construct an artificial human testicle and research how human sperm are made from stem cells received a grant from the NIH.
Scientists at Joslin Diabetes Center, Harvard University, and the University of Cambridge have found that the age-related impairment of the body’s ability to replace protective myelin sheaths, which normally surround nerve fibers and allow them to send signals properly, may be reversible, offering new hope that therapeutic strategies aimed at restoring efficient regeneration can be effective in the central nervous system throughout life.
Maintaining balance is crucial. In Drosophila, the common fruit fly, the creation and maintenance of the blood supply requires such balance.
A therapy involving a natural compound may improve the ability of stem cells from umbilical cord blood to engraft in patients receiving a stem cell transplant for cancer or other diseases, a phase I clinical trial led by Dana-Farber Cancer Institute scientists indicates.
A survey of more than 200 human embryonic stem cell researchers in the United States found that nearly four in ten researchers have faced excessive delay in acquiring a human embryonic stem cell line and that more than one-quarter were unable to acquire a line they wanted to study.
Using a specially designed facility, UCLA stem cell scientists have taken human skin cells, reprogrammed them to be pluripotent and then differentiated them into neurons, using animal origin-free reagents and feeder conditions throughout the process.
Team investigating causes of Dravet syndrome presents new approach to understanding the syndrome to American Epilepsy Society.
A key protein that controls how the deadly plant poison and bioweapon ricin kills, has finally been identified by researchers at the Institute of Molecular Biotechnology in Vienna, Austria. The discovery was made using a revolutionary new technology that combines stem cell biology and modern screening methods.
Tweaking the levels of factors used during the reprogramming of adult cells into induced pluriopotent stem (iPS) cells can greatly affect the quality of the resulting iPS cells, according to Whitehead Institute researchers. This finding explains at least in part the wide variation in quality and fidelity of iPS cells created through different reprogramming methods.
Established human embryonic cell lines, including those approved for federal research funding under former President George W. Bush, are different than newly derived human embryonic stem cell lines, according to a study by UCLA stem cell researchers.
Scientists at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute have used IL-2, an immune system stimulant, as an immune system suppressor to treat a common, often debilitating side effect of donor stem cell transplantation in cancer patients. The effect, in some cases, was profound.
Using reprogrammed cells and microthreads, scientists at WPI and CellThera open the door for a new clinical therapy to treat major muscle trauma.
Researchers from UCLA’s cancer and stem cell centers have demonstrated for the first time that blood stem cells can be engineered to create cancer-killing T-cells that seek out and attack a human melanoma. The researchers believe this approach could be useful in 40 percent of Caucasians with this malignancy.
UB research establishes that new heart cells can be regenerated in a stem cell therapy potentially applicable to patients suffering from heart dysfunction arising from insufficient blood flow to the heart. This is being presented today (Nov. 15) at the American Heart Association annual meeting.
Human pluripotent stem cells, which can develop into any cell type in the body, rely heavily on glycolysis, or sugar fermentation, to drive their metabolic activities.
Researchers from Mount Sinai School of Medicine have discovered the therapeutic benefit of fetal stem cells in helping the maternal heart recover after heart attack or other injury. The research marks a significant advancement in cardiac regenerative medicine.
A research network led by a Mayo Clinic physician found that stem cells obtained from bone marrow delivered two to three weeks after a person has a heart attack did not improve heart function. This is the first study to systematically examine the timing and method of stem cell delivery and provides vital information for the field of cell therapy.
Sarcomas are cancerous tumors of the soft tissue and bone. Although they are rare in children, they present a medical challenge when they occur. Diagnosis and treatment of a group of malignancies known as pediatric undifferentiated soft tissue sarcomas are difficult because their cell of origin is unknown. Finding ways to differentiate tumors will lead to better diagnosis and more specific therapies.
By irradiating typical polystyrene lab plates with ultraviolet (UV) waves, Whitehead Institute and MIT scientists have created a surface capable of tripling the number of human embryonic stem (ES) and induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells that can be grown in culture by current methods.
One of the few reliable ways to extend an organism's lifespan, be it a fruit fly or a mouse, is to restrict calorie intake. Now, a new study in fruit flies is helping to explain why such minimal diets are linked to longevity and offering clues to the effects of aging on stem cell behavior.
Age alone no longer should be considered a defining factor when determining whether an older patient with blood cancer is a candidate for stem cell transplantation. That’s the conclusion of the first study summarizing long-term outcomes from a series of prospective clinical trials of patients age 60 and over who were treated with the mini-transplant, a “kinder, gentler” form of allogeneic (donor cell) stem cell transplantation developed at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center. The findings are published Nov. 2 in JAMA.
New method shows promise in eliminating the need for long-term anti-rejection drugs, particularly for hand and face transplants.
The prospect of doing human clinical trials with stem cells to treat diseases like multiple sclerosis may be growing closer, say scientists at UB and U of R who have developed a more precise way to isolate stem cells that will make myelin.
Johns Hopkins researchers have developed a way to stimulate a rat’s stem cells after a liver transplant as a means of preventing rejection of the new organ without the need for lifelong immunosuppressant drugs. The need for anti-rejection medicines, which carry serious side effects, is a major obstacle to successful long-term transplant survival in people.
Researchers with UCLA’s Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center have developed and used a high-throughput molecular screening approach that identifies and characterizes chemical compounds that can target the stem cells that are responsible for creating deadly brain tumors.
Research shows that adult human mesenchymal stem cells may have an important role in the treatment and repair of spinal cord injuries.
Using a patient’s own stem cells, researchers at Johns Hopkins have corrected the genetic alteration that causes sickle cell disease (SCD), a painful, disabling inherited blood disorder that affects mostly African-Americans. The corrected stem cells were coaxed into immature red blood cells in a test tube that then turned on a normal version of the gene.
Scientists at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine found a way to rapidly produce pure populations of cells that grow into the protective myelin coating on nerves in mice. Their process opens a door to research and potential treatments for multiple sclerosis, cerebral palsy and other demyelinating diseases afflicting millions of people worldwide.
Regenerative Medicine Institute’s Stem Cell Core Facility to Produce Cells for Research Supported by National Institutes of Health and California Institute for Regenerative Medicine
Researchers have shown they can reverse the aging process for human adult stem cells, which are responsible for helping old or damaged tissues regenerate. The findings could lead to medical treatments that may repair a host of ailments that occur because of tissue damage as people age.
Gene therapy delivered directly to a particularly stubborn type of breast cancer cell causes the cells to self-destruct, lowers chance of recurrence and helps increase the effectiveness of some types of chemotherapy, researchers at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center reported in the Sept. 13 edition of Cancer Cell.
In a study published today (Sunday, Sept. 11), researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison report the first full measurement of the proteins made by both types of stem cells. In a study that looked at four embryonic stem cells and four IPS cells, the proteins turned out to be 99 percent similar, says Joshua Coon, an associate professor of chemistry and biomolecular chemistry who directed the project.
All stem cells—regardless of their source—share the remarkable capability to replenish themselves by undergoing self-renewal. Yet, so far, efforts to grow and expand scarce hematopoietic (or blood-forming) stem cells in culture for therapeutic applications have been met with limited success.
McMaster researchers have found one more reason to exercise: working out triggers influential stem cells to become bone instead of fat, improving overall health by boosting the body’s capacity to make blood.
Using a patient’s own bone marrow stem cells to treat acute stroke is feasible and safe, according to the results of a ground-breaking Phase I trial at The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth).
Research published today focuses on patients and shows that acute myeloid leukemia (AML) contains rare cells with stem cell properties, called leukemia stem cells (LSC), that are better at predicting clinical outcome than the majority of AML cells, showing for the first time that LSCs are significant not just in experimental models but also in patients.
New stem cell lines developed from the skin of adults living with bipolar disorder are providing researchers at the University of Michigan Health System an unprecedented opportunity to delve into the genetic and biological underpinnings of the devastating mood disorder.
New findings by scientists at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard and Whitehead Institute point to a decentralized society in tumors, with cancer cells able to interconvert between different types. These results have potential implications for the treatment of tumors, in particular, that attacking cancer stem cells alone may not be enough to fight cancer.
Stem cell researchers at UCLA have discovered that three types of cells derived from human embryonic stem cells and induced pluripotent stem cells are similar to each other, but are much more developmentally immature than previously thought when compared to those same cell types taken directly from human tissue.
Stem cell researchers at UCLA have uncovered for the first time why adult human cardiac myocytes have lost their ability to proliferate, perhaps explaining why the human heart has little regenerative capacity.
Researchers at the University of California, Santa Cruz, are developing new microscope technologies to enable biologists to see deep within living tissues and observe critical processes involved in basic biology and disease.
Researchers at the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center have found that a type of normal stem cell fuels ovarian cancer by encouraging cancer stem cells to grow.
Using two methods, Whitehead researchers have manipulated targeted genes in both human embryonic stem (ES) cells and induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells. In one case, scientists employed proteins known as ZFNs to change a single base pair in the genome, allowing them either to insert or remove mutations known to cause early-onset Parkinson’s disease (PD).
Researches near goal of using a patient's own cells to make stem cells that can replace lost or diseased tissue.
1) Cranial radiotherapy is known to lead to cognitive dysfunction; 2) Stem cells conformed to ethical guidelines.
Researchers at the Salk Institute have been able to genetically incorporate "unnatural" amino acids, such as those emitting green fluorescence, into neural stem cells, which then differentiate into brain neurons with the incandescent "tag" intact.
For the first time since stem cells were discovered here 50 years ago, scientists have isolated a human blood stem cell in its purest form – as a single stem cell capable of regenerating the entire blood system. This breakthrough opens the door to harnessing the power of these life-producing cells to treat cancer and other debilitating diseases more effectively.
This study showed that pluripotent cells are not all equal. The researchers discovered the fate – or destination – of human pluripotent stem cells is encoded by how their DNA is arranged, and this can be detected by specific proteins on the surface of the stem cells.
Mesenchymal stem cells were hailed as key to growing new organs, but have proven to be potent defenders and healers in the body. Researchers at Case Western Reserve University and elsewhere find the cells appear effective against a growing list of diseases and conditions.
For nearly two decades, the medical world and the American public have grappled with the lightning-rod topic of stem cells, in particular the controversy surrounding cells from human embryos. But when researchers four years ago successfully “reprogrammed” adult body cells to become stem cells, some thought the ethical debate was nearly over. Those redirected cells, known as induced pluripotent cells, or iPS cells, show potential as therapy.