“Latest Stem Cells News”

An agreement on funding stem cell research is closer than previously thought. A change in direction on financing stem cell research by US President Barack Obama has excited the American scientific community, starting with the major universities in California, including the San Francisco State, San Jose’ University, Stanford, and Berkeley. This time it will be the California Institute of Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) to open its wallet, ready to fund grants worth 58 million dollars to groups and researchers studying stem cells.

Incoming search terms:

Rhode Island-based biotechnology company MultiCell Technologies Inc. is teaming up with Maxim Biotech Inc. under cooperative research and development agreement to develop products for studying liver stem cells and liver cancer.

MultiCell (OTC: MCET), based in Woonsocket, owns exclusive rights to two issued U.S. patents, one U.S. patent application and a handful of corresponding foreign patents and patent applications regarding the isolation and differentiation of liver stem cells.

No financial details of the agreement with South San Francisco-based Maxim Biotech were disclosed. The deal will initially focus on creating a family of research reagent tool kits which can be used to isolate liver stem cells and help to determine liver stem cell gene function and their encoded proteins.

Incoming search terms:

Gerhard Bauer & Jan A. Nolta

A new experimental technique in the future will remove skin cells from HIV patients, manipulate the cells bringing them to a state similar to that of stem cells, and then re-implant them in the same patient to eliminate the virus. The technique is still in the experimental phase in mice, but according to Gerhard Bauer, presenting the initial results of his study today at the 50th American Society of Hematology Congress in San Francisco, it’s a possibility. Bauer has been working for more than 10 years on this technique together with colleague Joseph Anderson.

The objective is to identify anti-HIV genes and insert them into stem cells produced by the skin. His UC Davis-Sacramento research team will also be present at the conference, and together they will present their study, which will lead to clinical genetic experimentation to demonstrate the safety of their method. Bauer hopes to be able perform clinical experimentation on human beings within five years. “The transformed cells, called pluripotent stem cells, are able to differentiate into different types of cells, which include hematopoietic stem cells found in the bone marrow, which produce various types of immune cells. “The next step is a test on human beings,” said Bauer.

Incoming search terms:

Oncologists are now faced with the challenge of understanding how specialized drugs can strike tumor stem cells and impair their ability to replicate and spread. This is one of the most important questions that researchers will have to answer in upcoming years according to Regina Elena Institute hematologist Michele Milella. In San Francisco at the American Society of Hematology (ASH) Congress Milella spoke about future hematology issues, including fighting blood borne tumors with stem cell transplants over the past years.

“The ASH in this sense is an excellent indicator for where research is going, and represents an obligatory stop for hematologists and oncologists who study blood borne tumors. Each year, researchers meet here and outline the direction for future research until the next conference.” The research discussed here is being performed by numerous Italian scientists, assured Milella. “Italian hematology is among the best in the world, among the top in Europe, and even compared to the USA. Here at the ASH numerous high quality results have been presented by Italian research groups.”

From a hematology-oncology perspective, stem cells are considered a target in therapy; on the other hand, totipotent cancer stem cells are considered a possible key in curing cancer. “Here at the ASH we are entering into a new frontier using these types of cells to transplant preventatively treated mesenchymal stem cells from bone marrow, to transport therapeutic molecules to diseased cells. Numerous studies are ongoing.”

Incoming search terms:

Alessandra Sacco

A study on mice directed by Alessandra Sacco of Stanford University has shown that once inserted into a diseased muscle, just one adult muscular stem cell can reproduce to form an entire ‘family’ of cells and restore lost muscular function. In a leg muscle with no muscular stem cells that has been irreversibly damaged, a single adult stem cell can take root and multiply, restoring muscular function.

The study was presented today in the Annual Meeting of the American Society of Cell Biology
(ASCB) in San Francisco. The muscular stem cells in this case are called ‘satellite cells’, which normally repair muscular tissue when it is damaged. In many degenerative muscular diseases however, this ‘natural repair’ is lacking and the muscular fibers degrade slowly. The validity of stem cell transplants into diseased muscle has been demonstrated on more than one occasion, but this is the first time that a single cell transplant has been performed.
The stem cell family born from the single cell was able to repair the muscle and restore its function, another step forward in stem cell research to cure degenerative muscular diseases.

Incoming search terms: