Feature Channels: Stem Cells

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Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center researchers have identified a new population of intestinal stem cells that may hold clues to the origin of colorectal cancer. This new stem cell population, reported March 30 in the journal Cell, appears to be relatively quiescent (inactive) – in contrast to the recent discovery of intestinal stem cells that multiply rapidly – and is marked by a protein, Lrig1, that may act as a “brake” on cell growth and proliferation.

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A research network led by a Mayo Clinic physician found that stem cells derived from heart failure patients’ own bone marrow and injected into their hearts improved the function of the left ventricle, the heart’s pumping chamber. Researchers also found that certain types of the stem cells were associated with the largest improvement and warrant further study.

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The new Stem Cell Transplant Program at the University of Virginia Health System recently performed its first two stem cell transplants, using non-embryonic stem cells from umbilical cord blood. The program offers both bone marrow and stem cell transplants, with a focus on cord blood, to treat leukemia, lymphoma, Hodgkin’s disease and other blood diseases.

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Among patients with end-stage renal disease undergoing living-related kidney transplants, the use of bone-marrow derived mesenchymal (cells that can differentiate into a variety of cell types) stem cells instead of antibody induction therapy resulted in a lower incidence of acute rejection, decreased risk of opportunistic infection, and better estimated kidney function at 1 year, according to a study in the March 21 issue of JAMA.

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Research from a Kansas State University professor may make it easier to recover after spinal cord injury or to study neurological disorders. The research can greatly improve animal and human health by developing technology to advance cellular therapy and regenerative medicine.

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Huntington's disease, the debilitating congenital neurological disorder that progressively robs patients of muscle coordination and cognitive ability, is a condition without effective treatment, a slow death sentence.

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A research team has reprogrammed skin cells to identify epigenetic signatures that regulate the expression of a protein critical for repair of non-healing wounds. Identification of these signatures holds promise for future research aimed at applying these cells for personalized tissue regeneration.

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For the first time, scientists at the University of Wisconsin-Madison have made early retina structures containing proliferating neuroretinal progenitor cells using induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells derived from human blood.

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UCLA stem cell researchers have shown that insulin and nutrition keep blood stem cells from differentiating into mature blood cells in Drosophila, the common fruit fly, a finding that has implications for studying inflammatory response and blood development in response to dietary changes in humans.

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Stem cells provide a recurring topic among the scientific presentations at the Genetics Society of America’s 53rd Annual Drosophila Research Conference, March 7-11 in Chicago. Specifically, researchers are trying to determine how, within organs, cells specialize while stem cells maintain tissues and enable them to repair damage and respond to stress or aging.

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Physicians at the Methodist Neurological Institute are studying the use of human stem cells as a possible treatment for acute ischemic stroke, a leading cause of death and disability. Each year, stroke affects more than 15 million people around the world.

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Devising a novel method to identify potential genetic regulators in planarian stem cells, Whitehead Institute scientists have determined which of those genes affect the two main functions of stem cells.

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UCLA stem cell researchers have discovered a critical placental niche cell and signaling pathway that prevent blood precursors from premature differentiation in the placenta, a process necessary for ensuring proper blood supply for an individual’s lifetime.

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Rudolf Jaenisch to receive 2012’s top award in stem cell research and regenerative medicine.

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A UCSF stem cell study conducted in mice suggests a novel strategy for treating damaged cardiac tissue in patients following a heart attack. The approach potentially could improve cardiac function, minimize scar size, lead to the development of new blood vessels – and avoid the risk of tissue rejection.

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The University of Michigan’s first human embryonic stem cell line will be placed on the U.S. National Institutes of Health’s registry, making the cells available for federally-funded research. It is the first of the stem cell lines derived at the University of Michigan to be placed on the registry.

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Reviving a theory first proposed in the late 1800s that the development of organs in the normal embryo and the development of cancers are related, scientists at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies have studied organ development in mice to unravel how breast cancers, and perhaps other cancers, develop in people. Their findings provide new ways to predict and personalize the diagnosis and treatment of cancer.

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Whitehead Institute researchers have determined the critical role one enzyme, lysine-specific demethylase 1 (LSD1), plays as mouse embryonic stem cells (ESCs) differentiate. This research may provide targets for developing drugs to push cells with dysfunctional gene expression programs back to a more normal, healthier state.

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Experiments in brain-injured rats show that stem cells injected via the carotid artery travel directly to the brain, where they greatly enhance functional recovery, reports a study in the February issue of Neurosurgery, official journal of the Congress of Neurological Surgeons. The journal is published by Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, a part of Wolters Kluwer Health.

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Last week a U.S. company announced initial Phase I/II clinical trial results for ALS (Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis).

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Heart failure is a leading cause of death in Canada. As part of the ongoing IMPACT-CABG clinical trial to treat advanced heart failure, physicians at the Peter Munk Cardiac Centre performed the first cardiac stem cell transplant in Ontario last week using stem cells derived from the patient’s own bone marrow, isolated completely within the operating room, and implanted into the heart at the time of coronary bypass surgery. Researchers hope that stem cell therapy may be developed into a novel treatment for the 50,000 Canadians diagnosed each year with advanced heart failure.

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Led by researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine, scientists have, for the first time, created stem cell-derived, in vitro models of sporadic and hereditary Alzheimer’s disease (AD), using induced pluripotent stem cells from patients with the much-dreaded neurodegenerative disorder.

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Scientists with the new Children’s Research Institute at UT Southwestern Medical Center have identified the environment in which blood-forming stem cells survive and thrive within the body, an important step toward increasing the safety and effectiveness of bone-marrow transplantation.

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Cancer treatments designed to block the growth of blood vessels were found to increase the number of cancer stem cells in breast tumors in mice, suggesting a possible explanation for why these drugs don’t lead to longer survival, according to a new study by researchers at the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center.

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A Creighton University School of Medicine researcher has received a $3.3 million grant to study what role adult stem cells might play in repairing damaged coronary arteries, following angioplasty/stenting.

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Scientists at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies have identified a gene that tells cells to develop multiple cilia, tiny hair-like structures that move fluids through the lungs and brain. The finding may help scientists generate new therapies that use stem cells to replace damaged tissues in the lung and other organs.

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A proposal to construct an artificial human testicle and research how human sperm are made from stem cells received a grant from the NIH.

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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.

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Maintaining balance is crucial. In Drosophila, the common fruit fly, the creation and maintenance of the blood supply requires such balance.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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Team investigating causes of Dravet syndrome presents new approach to understanding the syndrome to American Epilepsy Society.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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Using reprogrammed cells and microthreads, scientists at WPI and CellThera open the door for a new clinical therapy to treat major muscle trauma.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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New method shows promise in eliminating the need for long-term anti-rejection drugs, particularly for hand and face transplants.

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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.

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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.