Monthly Archives: February 2014

Parkinson #39;s Disease- Dr. Ashworth Discusses How Stem Cells Helped his Parkinson #39;s Disease
Dr. Ashworth came to Dr. Steenblock to help with his Parkinson #39;s Disease. He got amazing results after having a stem cell treatment. To learn more about how ...

By: David Steenblock

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Parkinson's Disease- Dr. Ashworth Discusses How Stem Cells Helped his Parkinson's Disease - Video

(This story is an update of my earlier blog post on the controversy over whether the stress-created STAP cells actually exist).

A stunning stem cell breakthrough announced last month is being examined for errors by the institute where the studys lead researcher works.

The Riken Institute in Japan has launched an investigation into the study, it told news outlets including the journal Nature, which published the study Jan. 29. The probe was launched after other stem cell researchers, who have failed to replicate the findings, are expressing growing doubt.

The study, led by Haruko Obokata of Riken, found that certain white cells from young mice could be easily converted into embryonic-like or pluripotent stem cells by immersing them in acid or subjecting them to other stresses.

Stem cell researcher Paul Knoepfler / California Institute for Regenerative Medicine

The creation of what the researchers called STAP cells appeared to be a great advance from existing methods used to create what are called induced pluripotent stem cells. The IPS methods require adding genes and chemicals and convert just a small percentage of cells treated.

But scientists examining the study said it apparently used inverted and duplicate images. These included one indicating that the cells grew a placenta, a sure sign that stem cells had been produced. Riken declined to say specifically which allegations it was investigating, according to the news reports.

Additionally, scientists including UC Davis stem cell researcher Paul Knoepfler said the finding appeared very unlikely. Pluripotent stem cells tend to form tumors, so producing them in response to stress should have been weeded out by evolution, Knoepfler wrote on his blog, ipscell.com. Hes also running an informal poll.

Weve had nine people put reports of various kinds there, and none of the reports seemed particularly encouraging, Knoepfler said in a Tuesday interview.

"There's a feeling that the duplication of the placenta image, which now one of the authors has confirmed was indeed a duplication, and also some duplication of data in a paper in 2011 by (co-author Charles) Vacanti and Obokata, has made people more concerned about their level of confidence in the finding overall," Knoepfler said.

Read the original here:
Doubts mount on STAP stem cells

New research from the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center and Georgia Regents University finds that a protein that fuels an inflammatory pathway does not turn off in breast cancer, resulting in an increase in cancer stem cells. This provides a potential target for treating triple negative breast cancer, the most aggressive form of the disease.

The researchers identified a protein, SOCS3, that is highly expressed in normal cells but undetectable in triple-negative breast cancer. They showed that this protein is degraded in cancers, blocking the cellular off-switch of a feedback loop involving the inflammatory protein interleukin 6, IL6. When the switch does not get turned off, it enables cancer stem cells to grow.

"We have known for a long time known that there are important links between inflammation and cancer, including similar pathways that regulate normal and cancer stem cells," says study author Max S. Wicha, M.D., distinguished professor of oncology and director of the U-M Comprehensive Cancer Center.

"This work helps explain why these pathways shut off in normal tissues after injury but remain active in cancers, resulting in an increase in cancer stem cells. Furthermore, they suggest that blocking these inflammatory loops may be a means of targeting cancer stem cells, improving patient outcome," he says.

The study appears in the Nature journal Oncogene.

Currently, there are no molecularly targeted therapies aimed at triple-negative breast cancer, which is a type of cancer negative for estrogen receptor, progesterone receptor and the HER2 protein -- all key targets for current therapies. Patients with this form of disease tend to have worse outcomes.

The researchers tested a drug, bortezomib, in mouse models of triple-negative breast cancer and found that it stops the protein degradation, resulting in the inflammatory loop shutting off, which reduces the cancer stem cells, thereby blocking metastasis. Bortezomib is currently approved for treatment of the blood cancer multiple myeloma.

This team previously showed that IL6 can stimulate breast cancer stem cells in HER2-positive breast cancers and they are designing a clinical trial which uses an IL6 blocker. The new research suggests that adding bortezomib to the IL6 inhibitor may be a way to target stem cells in triple-negative breast cancer.

"Now that we unveiled how inflammation is regulated in triple-negative breast cancer, we expect that our studies can be translated into the clinic. The drugs used to block these chemical messengers are already approved for the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis and other inflammation-related diseases, which should facilitate their use in cancer," says study author Hasan Korkaya, Ph.D., assistant professor at the Georgia Regents University Cancer Center.

More laboratory testing is needed before a clinical trial can begin. The researchers also suspect that this pathway may apply to other cancers as well and are investigating that further.

Read the original:
Potential options for attacking stem cells in triple-negative breast cancer

A proposed Parkinson's disease treatment from stem cells is on track for an application to be filed with federal regulators around the start of 2015, International Stem Cell Corp. said Tuesday.

The Carlsbad-based company said the U.S. Food and Drug Administration had met with researchers for guidance on what steps need to be taken before filing an application. The meeting went about as expected, said Simon Craw, executive vice president. Ongoing animal studies must be completed, along with safety testing. FDA officials discussed details such as the number of animals to be tested and how the safety studies are to be conducted, Craw said.

International Stem Cell's treatment consists of progenitor cells that mature into neural cells, including those making the neurotransmitter dopamine. These neurons are destroyed in the disease, causing progressive paralysis.

The progenitor cells are to be implanted into the brains of Parkinson's patients, where they are expected to make dopamine and protect the remaining dopamine-making neurons. They are derived from unfertilized, or parthenogenetic, human egg cells, made to grow without fertilization.

Human parthenogenetic neural stem cells in the process of differentiating into dopamine-producing neurons. / International Stem Cell Corp.

Interim data from tests in primates are expected in March, and final results later in the year. The Investigational New Drug application, or IND, is expected to be filed a short while thereafter, Craw said. Filing before year's end "would be a stretch," Craw said; the filing is more likely to take place in early 2015.

Shares of International Stem Cell closed Tuesday after the announcement at 24 cents, up 7 percent for the day. The company is working with outside scientists; including D. Eugene Redmond Jr., who is leading a pharmacology/toxicology study. Parkinson's expert Mark Stacy at Duke University will lead the clinical trial. Evan Y. Snyder, a stem cell expert at Sanford-Burnham Medical Research Institute, assists as a scientific advisor.

The company's approach is similar to one being studied by scientists at The Scripps Research Institute led by Jeanne Loring. Moreover, both are expected to ask approval to begin trials around the same time.

Loring's group gets its cells from the patients to be treated, "reprogrammed" back to an embryonic-like state and called induced pluripotent stem cells, then differentiated into the neural progenitor cells. That treatment's main advantage is the use of the patients' own or autologous cells, expected to minimize any possible immune reaction.

The two groups know each other. Craw said International Stem Cell has hired some of Loring's students, and they have collaborated on some research.

Continue reading here:
Intl. Stem Cell readies for Parkinson's study