Feature Channels: Stem Cells

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Before medical science can bioengineer human organs in a lab for therapeutic use, two remaining hurdles are ensuring genetic stability—so the organs are free from the risk of tumor growth—and producing organ tissues of sufficient volume and size for viable transplant into people. Scientists report in Stem Cell Reports achieving both goals with a new production method for bioengineered human gut and liver tissues.

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Moffitt Cancer Center researchers are trying to identify new drug targets to reduce the risk of GVHD. Their new study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, shows a drug that targets the protein JAK2 may reduce the risk of GVHD.

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In breakthrough colon cancer research, scientists at Christiana Care Health System’s Center for Translational Cancer Research (CTCR) of the Helen F. Graham Cancer Center & Research Institute have discovered that over-expression of HOXA4 and HOXA9 genes in colon cancer stem cells promotes cell replication and contributes to the overpopulation of stem cells that drives colon cancer development. The findings suggest treatment with vitamin A derivatives, called retinoid drugs, could provide a therapeutic strategy for decreasing the expression of these HOX genes and for targeting highly resistant cancer stem cells.

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Two different proteins work separately as well as synergistically to feed a small pool of stem cells that help bladder cancer resist chemotherapy, research led by a Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center scientist suggests. The finding, published online in Cancer Research, could lead to new targets to fight this deadly disease and potentially other cancers as well.

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Scientists often struggle to predict how these cells will act in different environments in the body.

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Researchers have data that diabetes impairs removal of dead heart-muscle cells by macrophages after heart attacks, and that exosomes can improve this removal. Impaired removal may be the reason diabetes increases the risk for cardiovascular disease, including heart failure.

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Long-term consequences can happen years after an ACL injury. One Michigan Medicine researcher is investigating new therapies that could minimize those unwanted effects.

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The approach could represent the first new treatment to improve survival in patients with severe scleroderma in more than four decades.

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A multi-institutional research team led by Indiana University School of Medicine scientists has developed a new way to harvest blood stem cells for bone marrow donation that is faster and more effective than the current standard of care.

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Researchers at the Eli and Edythe Broad Center of Regenerative Medicine and Stem Cell Research at UCLA have, for the first time, coaxed human stem cells to become sensory interneurons — the cells that give us our sense of touch. The new protocol could be a step toward stem cell–based therapies to restore sensation in paralyzed people who have lost feeling in parts of their body.

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UCLA researchers have developed the first map of gene regulation in human neurogenesis, the process by which neural stem cells turn into brain cells and the cerebral cortex expands in size. The scientists identified factors that govern the growth of our brains and, in some cases, set the stage for several brain disorders that appear later in life

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“Decorating” cardiac stem cells with platelet nanovesicles can increase the stem cells’ ability to find and remain at the site of heart attack injury and enhance their effectiveness in treatment.

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While refining ways to grow arterial endothelial cells in the lab, a regenerative biology team at the Morgridge Institute for Research at the University of Wisconsin-Madison unexpectedly unearthed a powerful new model for studying a hallmark of vascular disease.

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A multidisciplinary team led by Scott Rodeo, MD, and Christopher Mendias, PhD, at Hospital for Special Surgery (HSS) has been awarded the Orthopaedic Research and Education Foundation (OREF) Clinical Research Grant in Cellular Therapy.

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Researchers at Indiana University School of Medicine have successfully developed a method to grow hairy skin from mouse pluripotent stem cells—a discovery that could lead to new approaches to model disease and new therapies for the treatment of skin disorders and cancers.

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Compared to younger adults, older people have higher rates of complications from surgery. But many problems can be avoided by intervening with assessments and risk-reduction strategies before, during and after procedures.

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In a commentary published in the Jan. 4 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, UC Davis researcher William Murphy expressed cautious optimism about efforts to genetically engineer hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs) to temporarily resist cell death during transplantation. While these gene therapy approaches could dramatically improve patient outcomes, Murphy argues that their risks must be carefully studied in diverse models.

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Duke Health researchers, publishing in the Jan. 4 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, found significantly improved survival among patients with a severe form of scleroderma who underwent chemotherapy, whole body radiation and a stem cell transplant. Patients also had less need for immune suppressant drugs after transplant.

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Scientists at the National Eye Institute (NEI), part of the National Institutes of Health, report that tiny tube-like protrusions called primary cilia on cells of the retinal pigment epithelium (RPE)—a layer of cells in the back of the eye—are essential for the survival of the retina’s light-sensing photoreceptors. The discovery has advanced efforts to make stem cell-derived RPE for transplantation into patients with geographic atrophy, otherwise known as dry age-related macular degeneration (AMD), a leading cause of blindness in the U.S. The study appears in the January 2 Cell Reports.

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Through gene therapy, researchers engineered blood-forming stem cells (hematopoietic stem/progenitor cells, or HSPCs) to carry chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) genes to make cells that can detect and destroy HIV-infected cells. These engineered cells persisted for more than two years

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New research published in the Journal of Experimental Medicine highlights the pernicious effect of obesity on the long-term health of blood-making stem cells (hematopoietic stem cells). Published Dec. 27 and conducted largely in genetic models of obese mice, the study shows obesity causes durable and harmful changes to the hematopoietic stem cell compartment – the blood-making factory in our bodies.

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A team from Roswell Park Cancer Institute has discovered a unique population of normal stem cells that may enable prostate cancer relapse. These findings may point the way toward strategies for treating or preventing prostate cancer recurrence.

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Some secrets to repairing our skeletons might be found in the silky webs of spiders, according to recent experiments guided by supercomputers. Scientists involved say their results will help understand the details of osteoregeneration, or how bones repair themselves.

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Delivering drugs specifically to cancer cells is one approach researchers are taking to minimize treatment side effects. Stem cells, bacteria and other carriers have been tested as tiny delivery vehicles. Now a new potential drug carrier to treat gynecological conditions has joined the fleet: sperm. Scientistsreport in the journal ACS Nano that they have exploited the swimming power of sperm to ferry a cancer drug directly to a cervical tumor in lab tests.

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UCLA scientists have developed a new strategy to efficiently isolate, mature and transplant skeletal muscle cells created from human pluripotent stem cells, which can produce all cell types of the body. The findings are a major step towards developing a stem cell replacement therapy for muscle diseases including Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy.

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Cancer therapies often target cells that grow and divide rapidly, such as stem cells, but in studying how stomach cancers occur, researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis found that even when the stomach isn't able to make stem cells, other cells in the stomach can begin to divide and contribute to precancerous lesions.

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Nearly 6 million Americans have bipolar disorder, and most have probably wondered why. After more than a decade of studying over 1,100 of them in-depth, a team of scientists has an answer – or rather, seven answers.

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In a phase 1/2a study jCyte's investigational therapy, jCell, showed a good safety profile and indications of potential benefit for patients with retinitis pigmentosa

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Professor Robin Franklin to receive the 2017 Barancik Prize for pioneering work to restore function for people with progressive MS. He will receive the award at ACTRIMS Forum 2018 on February 1 in San Diego, California.

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A new study led by SBP describes the biology behind why muscle stem cells respond differently to aging or injury. The findings, published in Cell Stem Cell, have important implications for the normal wear and tear of aging.

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A special cluster of proteins helps unwind DNA during cell division and plays a key role in keeping stem cells in their immature state. This UNC study also points to a better understanding of how cancer cells manage to sustain rapid cell division without triggering cell death.

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For many people with classical Hodgkin lymphoma, the disease is one of the most curable forms of cancer with standard chemotherapy or chemo plus radiotherapy. But for the 10 to 30 percent of patients whose cancer relapses, or doesn’t respond to initial therapy, secondary treatment often involves harsher chemotherapies followed by an autologous stem cell transplant, which uses a patient’s own stem cells.

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A study by researchers at Mayo Clinic’s campus in Jacksonville, Florida has found that barriers to patients receiving stem cell therapy as part of their treatment for multiple myeloma include income, education, insurance status and access to care at an academic center or facility that treats a high volume of patients.

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Rare stem-like tumor cells play a critical role in the spread of breast cancer, but a vulnerability in the pathway that powers them offers a strategy to target these cells using existing drugs before metastatic disease occurs, report University of California San Diego School of Medicine and Moores Cancer Center researchers.

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Immunotherapy agents known as checkpoint inhibitors have shown considerable promise in patients with hematologic cancers who relapse after a transplant with donor stem cells. Preliminary results from the first clinical trial in these patients of one such agent – nivolumab – indicate that along with signs of effectiveness, it also produced significant side effects at the dose initially studied. The findings indicate a need for further clinical trials in this group before being considered for off-label use with these patients, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute investigators report.

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Results from a phase 2 clinical trial, presented by Seattle Children’s Research Institute at the 59th American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting, show that the drug Abatacept (Orencia) nearly eliminated life-threatening severe acute graft-versus-host disease (GvHD) in patients receiving hematopoietic stem cell transplants.

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2-year-old Children's Hospital Los Angeles patient Pierce Kelly beats leukemia thanks to a stem cell donor in France and inspires thousands of potential donors.

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Using a database of multiple myeloma patient samples and information, researchers at University of California San Diego School of Medicine found that high ADAR1 levels correlate with reduced survival rates. They also determined that blocking the enzyme reduces multiple myeloma regeneration in experimental models derived from patient cancer cells.

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The Independent Citizens Oversight Committee of the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) unanimously approved yesterday two grants worth a total of almost $8 million to University of California San Diego School of Medicine researchers investigating novel stem cell-based treatments for acute myeloid leukemia or AML.

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esearchers found that conditional deletion of Sox2 – the gene encoding the SOX2 stem cell transcription factor – and the associated dampening of astrocyte reactivity appear to promote functional recovery, including behavioral recovery, after traumatic brain injury, said Dr. Zhang, a W.W. Caruth, Jr. Scholar in Biomedical Research.

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A stem cell therapy did not improve walking ability in people with peripheral artery disease, although exercise did lead to significant improvements, according to a new study. This is the largest trial of this type of therapy in people with blockages in leg arteries. Scientists were disappointed that stem cell therapy didn’t improve walking, because earlier research suggested it could be beneficial.

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In a study published in Stem Cell Reports, Rui Zhao and colleagues have partly solved a long-unanswered basic question about stem cells — why are pluripotent stem cells that have mutations to block the production of microRNAs unable to differentiate?

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Results from two early clinical trials show that it may be possible to use human embryonic stem cells as treatment for the dry form of macular degeneration, according to presentations given today at AAO 2017, the 121st Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Ophthalmology.

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In a report published this week (Nov. 8, 2017) in Science Advances, researchers from the University of Wisconsin-Madison detail a defined, step-by-step process to make a more exact mimic of the human blood-brain-barrier in the laboratory dish. The new model will permit more robust exploration of the cells, their properties and how scientists might circumvent the barrier for therapeutic purposes.

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Rural counties continue to rank lowest among counties across the U.S., in terms of health outcomes. A group of national organizations including the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the National 4-H Council are leading the way to close the rural health gap.

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UNC School of Medicine neuroscientists discover a long-distance brain circuit that controls the production of new neurons in the hippocampus. Research could have implications for understanding and treating many brain disorders, including epilepsy, schizophrenia, depression, and Alzheimer’s disease

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Nathan Bryan, PH.D., one of the nation’s leading experts on critically important role of nitric oxide in health and disease prevention, told attendees of the Pacific Regenerative Medicine 2017 Conference this morning that, “Stem cells are the future of medicine and are required for our body to heal itself; however, their success depends on the body producing enough nitric oxide to support their healing properties. Simply, put, without the right amount of NO in the body, our own stem cells fail to function and furthermore, those receiving stem cell therapy may have limited success without proper NO production.”

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An infusion of cells from a child’s own umbilical cord blood appears to improve brain connectivity and motor function in children with spastic cerebral palsy, according to a randomized clinical trial published this week by Stem Cells Translational Medicine.

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Researchers at University of California San Diego School of Medicine report that a single infusion of wildtype hematopoietic stem and progenitor cells (HSPCs) into a mouse model of Friedreich’s ataxia (FA) measurably halted cellular damage caused by the degenerative disease.

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In fairy tales, all it takes to transform a frog into a prince or a mouse into a horse is the wave of a magic wand. But in the real world, transforming one living cell into another - for instance a skin cell into a nerve cell - isn’t so easy. Now, scientists lay out a possible way to do it directly.