Category Archives: North Carolina Stem Cells

Bald blokes will no longer have to look like Dr Evil thanks to a "miracle potion".

Scientists found that stem cells from fat can help hair grow back on slapheads, like the baddie in the Austin Powers movies.

The topical solution is ideal for those suffering from androgenetic alopecia (AGA), commonly known as male-pattern baldness.

Participants in a recent clinical trial who put the potion on their scalp twice a day for 16 weeks were found to have "significant increase" in hair count.

Scientists found the proteins secreted from stem cells helped to increase the size of the hair follicle during hair development.

Professor Sang Yeoup Lee, from Pusan National University Yangsan Hospital in South Korea said: "Our findings suggest that the application of the solution has enormous potential for hair regrowth in patients with AGA, by increasing both hair density and thickness.

"The next step should be to conduct similar studies to confirm the beneficial effects on hair growth."

Pattern baldness is caused by genetic, hormonal and environmental factors, and affects around 50% of all men and almost as many women over the age of 50.

The condition, while not life-threatening, can destroy a person's self-esteem and cause severe psychological problems.

While various over-the-counter medications can treat hair loss, these products often cause side effects including loss of libido and erectile dysfunction.

The stem cell "potion" could provide a healthier alternative for those desperate to get back a full head of hair.

Anthony Atala, of the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine, in North Carolina, said: "For the millions of people who suffer from male-pattern baldness, this small clinical trial offers hope of a treatment.

"The topical solution created from proteins secreted by stem cells found in fat tissue proves to be both safe and effective.

"We look forward to further findings that support this work."

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Balding men could grow hair back in weeks thanks to 'miracle potion' - Daily Star

CHAPEL HILL When Sabrina Shelton received her college degree in 2007, her thoughts were focused on her future. She considered grad school and going straight into the workforce, looking for housing and starting salaries, but what she didnt expect was a cancer diagnosis.

In April of 2008, Shelton, now 34, of Bedford, Virginia, was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia, derailing her plans for the next phase of her life and fast tracking her into a month of cancer treatment, followed by a year of after care.

At the time, youre asking yourself, What do I want to do? What do I want? she said. Its the kind of existential question that were all asking ourselves as we graduated college, and then you get your answer.

For Shelton, her cancer journey started off smoothly. She was in remission within a month of starting treatment and was cancer-free for almost five years a standard cancer survivorship benchmark. But her cancer returned in 2012 and again in 2014. And still again in 2018.

I just wanted to get to that five-year mark so bad, Shelton said. I was of course upset about it and disappointed that it didnt at least get me to the five-year mark, because thats the target number that I wanted. With every recurrence, I do have those moments where when I initially hear about it, Im shocked.

The bulk of Sheltons care had been at the University of Virginia Cancer Center, with the exception of a stem cell transplant with UNC LinebergersPaul Armistead, MD. With her recurrence in 2018, she had exhausted traditional treatment options, so Sheltons care team referred her to UNC LinebergersMatthew Foster, MD, for a chimeric antigen receptor T-cell (CAR-T) therapy clinical trial.

CAR-T immunotherapyuses a patients own immune system to fight their cancer. This involves extracting the patients T-cells, manipulating them to recognize the patients cancer, and then re-infusing them into the patient to attack their cancer cells.

One advantage of these altered T-cells is that they can survive and persist within the body and, not only be an army of cells for one time, but an occupying force, Foster said.

At the North Carolina Cancer Hospital clinic in Chapel Hill, Foster was both optimistic and realistic about Sheltons prognosis, taking time to answer her questions. CAR-T being a relatively new treatment, however, there were not a lot of outcomes and results he could share with Shelton, a self-proclaimed numbers person.

I want to know how many people have had it, how many have survived, how long has it lasted? she said. And they just cant tell me its going to last short term or long term. But the clinical trial itself went way better than I had imagined in my mind of how it would go.

Foster and the cellular immunotherapy team at UNC Lineberger look for new treatments for difficult-to-treat cancers, and Shelton was part of the corresponding study that aimed to make treatments safer.

Fortunately, she had an easier pathway with these CAR-T therapies than she did with her transplant, Foster said. Thats not necessarily true for all patients. There are patients who have had more profound toxicities.

For Shelton, the difference in treatment strategies was significant. With CAR-T, she didnt suffer the same types of side effects she had with chemotherapy and radiation or the lengthy hospital stay and recovery with the stem cell transplant. There was no hair loss; no mouth sores; no bone-deep fatigue. She said her real fear was neurological effects from the CAR-T treatment, but her cognition was unaffected.

The only major thing Ive had was a fever. I never had any of the hallucinations or the other major neurological symptoms, she said. For that to be the biggest side effect that I had, I was certainly blessed.

We see a number of young adults and adolescents with acute lymphoblastic leukemia. Unfortunately, this population is often in the midst of launching themselves from under their parents wings and launching their careers or education, Foster said. Sometimes the parents take an active role, and sometimes the parents dont. Sabrina is fortunate to have supportive parents and a great attitude herself in terms of taking care of herself and trying to blend her care for herself with her career aspirations and personal life.

These days, Sheltons focus is on her life outside of cancer. She enjoys volunteering at a bridal shop that receives donated dresses from high-end shops like Kleinfeld Bridal in New York and gives the proceeds to help women in need. She recently took trips to Colorado and California. Shes even planning to go to New York something she couldnt imagine doing during her initial diagnosis and recurrence.

I see everybody else around me living life. So, I feel like, why cant I? she said. Of course, life can happen in between all of these plans, but Im just not going to sit back and watch life pass me. Im going to get out there as much as I possibly can.

Learn more about theCAR-T Immunotherapy Programat UNC Lineberger.

(C) UNC

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Treatment in clinical trial offers options to woman fighting return of cancer (+ video) - WRAL Tech Wire

Recent developments in the field of stem cell research are paving a path towards a radical shift in the way we diagnose and treat dementia. Stem cells have excited scientists for years and research groups across the globe are using them to advance modern medicine. Using stem cells to aid the fight against dementia is perhaps one of the most critical applications of the technology. Dementia is the leading cause of death in the UK, sixth in US and fifth globally, with an estimated 50 million people currently affected.

The term dementia does not relate to a single disease, but more an array of symptoms that can arise from multiple conditions. The most common is Alzheimers disease (AD) which accounts for up to 80% of all cases. Dementia itself is caused by the death of cells that make up the complex circuitry of our brains and an eventual loss of large portions of the brain. Patients suffering with dementia often exhibit the same general symptoms such as confusion, memory loss and an inability to perform day to day functions. It is a debilitating condition that often strikes the most vulnerable members of society and, consequently, many research groups around the globe work to try to understand dementia-causing diseases to provide better diagnostic and treatment platforms.

In 2007, a research group at Kyoto University in Japan published a study with the potential to change the face of research into dementia along with many other fields. Professor Shinya Yamanaka and his research team developed a method whereby stem cells (cells that can be transformed/differentiated into cells from any tissue) could be generated from a sample of skin. The study, which resulted in a 2012 Nobel Prize for Prof. Yamanaka, demonstrated that skin cells could be isolated from a patient and genetically reprogrammed into induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs). In short, this technology made it possible to generate and study brain cells from a patient with dementia without having to remove any of their brain. All they would need to do is provide scientists with a sample of skin.

Since this development, research groups around the globe have started using iPSCs from many patients with dementia in order to understand the biological mechanisms that underlie disease. Dr Eric Hill runs a research group at Aston University in the UK that specializes in iPSCs for dementia research and he had the following to say about the technology:

Its really exciting because it allows us to study cells with genetic mutations that are patient specific. We can get a much better picture of what is actually happening in the brains of these patients. We can now generate all the different cell types found in the human brain and understand how they function together and map the changes that result in disease.

The latter was perhaps most powerfully demonstrated in a study published by a team at the University of North Carolina, led by Professor Hansang Cho. The team was able to generate three key cell subtypes that play important roles in brain function; study the impact of mutations associated with Alzheimers disease; and even replicate some of the core malfunctions found to trigger disease in the brains of patients.

Studies like this are of significance because a large part of the focus in dementia research is on trying to understand how such changes in function arise. When a patient is diagnosed with a disease such as Alzheimers it is often too late for effective treatment. Scientists, instead, seek to elucidate those early changes in brain cell function in order to diagnose patients earlier to give more time for treatment. It is very much a case of prevention being better than a cure. Dr Hill provided an encouraging statement regarding this:

When we generate brain cells from iPSCs the cells we get are developmentally very young. What is interesting is the fact we still see differences between cells from dementia patients versus healthy patients suggesting we could find markers to help us detect and prevent disease some years before it develops.

Despite such promise, however, iPSCs have yet to provide the field of dementia research with that big break. Multiple treatments have progressed into clinical trials since the technology first emerged but no therapies have been approved. Drugs that show promise in the lab fail to deliver on their potential in patient clinical trials, sending researchers back to square one.

We should not be disheartened by this, however, and should instead view it as space into which the technology of using iPSCs to study dementia can grow. A lot of drugs fail in clinical trials because the platforms used to run initial tests dont provide scientists with a wide enough perspective of how those drugs will influence human cells. Additionally, many preclinical studies use animals with dementia-causing disease artificially induced into them. Studies like this often fail to translate into humans because the initial data is not from a human perspective. This is where researchers like Dr. Hill think iPSCs can provide us with an advantage:

iPSCs could provide us with much better platforms for screening drugs to treat and prevent these diseases. They can really add to what we already have, and while we might not be able to grow a full human brain, we can generate the cells that provide the building blocks for one. They give us the chance to screen new therapies more efficiently, better test their effectiveness and reduce the amount of animal use in dementia research.

Dr Hill is not alone in seeing the promise of using iPSCs to find better treatments for preventing the progression of dementia. Multiple research groups around the world have shown the potential of iPSC-derived brain cells for studying the effectiveness of new therapies.

In the last 12 months we have observed a wave of new studies using iPSCs to try to develop better treatments for diseases like Alzheimers, Parkinsons, Huntingtons disease and ALS. From studies in the University of California identifying cholesterol metabolism as a potential target to treating Alzheimers to studies in Luxembourg helping us find better treatments for Parkinsons, it is easy to see why the global effort to get that big break from iPSCs continues to gain interest. We might still be waiting for that next Noble Prize-winning discovery that will improve the lives of millions of patients but the collective effort of iPSC research groups across the world brings us a step closer with every study they publish. Dementia may, one day, be a thing of the past and iPSC research will likely be a significant part in getting us there.

Sam Moxon has a PhD in regenerative medicine and is currently involved in dementia research. He is a freelance writer with an interest in the development of new technologies to diagnose and treat degenerative diseases. Follow him on Twitter @DrSamMoxon

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Searching for the 'big break' that could turn stem cells into a weapon against dementia - Genetic Literacy Project

Like many other respiratory conditions, COVID-19the disease caused by SARS-CoV-2can vary widely among patients. The vast majority of confirmed cases are considered mild, involving mostly cold-like symptoms to mild pneumonia, according to the latest and largest set of data on the new coronavirus outbreak released February 17 by the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

Fourteen percent of confirmed cases have been severe, involving serious pneumonia and shortness of breath. Another 5 percent of patients confirmed to have the disease developed respiratory failure, septic shock, and/or multi-organ failurewhat the agency calls critical cases potentially resulting in death. Roughly 2.3 percent of confirmed cases did result in death.

Scientists are working to understand why some people suffer more from the virus than others. It is also unclear why the new coronaviruslike its cousins SARS and MERSappears to be more deadly than other coronaviruses that regularly circulate among people each winter and typically cause cold symptoms. I think its going to take a really, really long time to understand the mechanistic, biological basis of why some people get sicker than others, says Angela Rasmussen, a virologist at Columbia Universitys Mailman School of Public Health.

In the meantime, the latest data from China and research on other coronaviruses provide some hints.

The latest data from China stem from an analysis of nearly 45,000 confirmed cases, and on the whole suggest that the people most likely to develop severe forms of COVID-19 are those with pre-existing illnesses and the elderly.

While less than 1 percent of people who were otherwise healthy died from the disease, the fatality rate for people with cardiovascular disease was 10.5 percent. That figure was 7.3 percent for diabetes patients and around 6 percent for those with chronic respiratory disease, hypertension, or cancer.

While overall, 2.3 percent of known cases proved fatalwhich many experts say is likely an overestimate of the mortality rate, given that many mild cases might go undiagnosedpatients 80 years or older were most at risk, with 14.8 percent of them dying. Deaths occurred in every age group except in children under the age of nine, and, generally speaking, we see relatively few cases among children, World Health Organization Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said last week.

This pattern of increasing severity with age differs from that of some other viral outbreaks, notably the 1918 flu pandemic, for which mortality was high in young children and in people between 20 and 40 years of age. However, its broadly consistent with records of the SARS and MERS coronavirus outbreaks, notes Lisa Gralinski, a virologist at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. If youre over fifty or sixty and you have some other health issues and if youre unlucky enough to be exposed to this virus, it could be very bad, she says.

I think its going to take a really, really long time to understand the mechanistic, biological basis of why some people get sicker than others.

Angela Rasmussen, Columbia University

Scientists dont know what exactly happens in older age groups. But based on research on other respiratory viruses, experts theorize that whether a coronavirus infection takes a turn for the worse depends on a persons immune response. The virus matters, but the host response matters at least as much, and probably more, says Stanley Perlman, a virologist and pediatric infectious disease specialist at the University of Iowa.

Once SARS-CoV-2 gets inside the human respiratory tract, its thought to infect and multiply in cells lining the airway, causing damage that kicks the immune system into action. In most people, it should trigger a wave of local inflammation, recruiting immune cells in the vicinity to eradicate the pathogen. The immune response then recedes, and patients recover.

For reasons that arent entirely clear, some peopleespecially the elderly and sickmay have dysfunctional immune systems that fail to keep the response to particular pathogens in check. This could cause an uncontrolled immune response, triggering an overproduction of immune cells and their signaling molecules and leading to a cytokine storm often associated with a flood of immune cells into the lung. Thats when you end up with a lot of these really severe inflammatory disease conditions like pneumonia, shortness of breath, inflammation of the airway, and so forth, says Rasmussen.

Local inflammation can turn into widespread inflammation of the lungs, which then has ripple effects across all organs of the body. This could also happen if the virus replicates faster than the immune system can respond, so that it then has to play catch-up to contain the pathogena situation that could also cause the immune defense to spiral out of control. With mice, we know that in some cases, particularly for SARS and MERS coronaviruses, virus replication is very rapid and in some cases overwhelming to the immune system, says Perlman.

Its harder to explain why young, healthy people also sometimes die from the diseasefor instance, Li Wenliang, a 34-year-old doctor who first sounded the alarm about the virus. He died a few weeks after contracting the pathogen.

Genetic and environmental risk factors might help explain the severity of infections. Though its clear that genetic factors can strongly determine the outcome of viral infections in miceas some of Rasmussens work has shown for Ebola, for instanceresearchers havent yet been able to tease out specific genes or variants in mice, let alone in people, that are responsible for varying degrees of illness. Environmental factors, such as smoking or air quality, may also play a role in disease severity, Rasmussen adds.

A lot of research has gone into understanding what causes respiratory failure that results from systemic inflammation of the lungsalso called acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS)that can occur from coronaviruses and other infections. Yet researchers still dont know how it occurs exactly, let alone how to treat it, Gralinksi notes. Its still a really poorly understood issue.

An intriguing finding in the new data released last week is that although similar numbers of men and women have contracted SARS-CoV-2, more men are dying from the disease. The death rate for males was 2.8 percent and 1.7 percent for women. Rasmussen is quick to caution that although the data encompass nearly 45,000 patients, thats still not that many people to determine if theres really a gender biasyoud have to look at this in a much larger population of patients in a number of different countries, she says.

That said, if there is a bias, it would be consistent with what epidemiologists have observed during the SARS and MERS outbreaks. In the 2003 SARS outbreak in Hong Kong, for instance, nearly 22 percent of infected men died, compared to around 13 percent of women. In an analysis of MERS infections between 2017 and 2018, around 32 percent of men died, and nearly 26 percent of women. The difference could have something to do with the fact that the gene for the ACE-2 receptor, which is used by both SARS-CoV-2 and the SARS virus to enter host cells, is found on the X chromosome, she speculates. If its a particular variant of the protein that makes people more susceptible to the virus, then females could compensate for that one bad variant because theyd have two copies of the X chromosome, whereas men would be stuck with only one copy. Or, it could be that men are more likely to be smokers and so their lungs are already a bit compromised. Theres definitely more to be teased out there, Gralinski says.

Some of Perlmans research, which demonstrated that the sex disparity also holds true in SARS-infected mice, points to the hormone estrogen as possibly having protective effects: Removing the ovaries of infected female mice or blocking the estrogen receptor made the animals more likely to die compared to infected control mice. The effects are probably more pronounced in mice than in people, Perlman tells The New York Times.

Whether patients develop antibodies after SARS-CoV-2 infection that will protect them against future infections is still a mystery. Surveys of SARS patients around five or 10 years after their recovery suggest that the coronavirus antibodies dont persist for very long, Gralinski says. They found either very low levels or no antibodies that were able to recognize SARS proteins.

However, for the new coronavirus, we would expect some immunity, at least in the short term, she says.

There are seven coronaviruses known to infect people. Four of them229E, NL63, OC43, and HKU1typically cause a cold and only rarely result in death. The other threeMERS-CoV, SARS-CoV, and the new SARS-CoV-2have varying degrees of lethality. In the 2003 SARS outbreak, 10 percent of infected people died. Between 2012 and 2019, MERS killed 23 percent of infected people. Although the case fatality rate of COVID-19 is lower, the virus has already killed more people than the other two outbreaks combined, which some have attributed to the pathogens fast transmission.

The cold-causing coronaviruses, as well as many other viruses that cause common colds, are typically restricted to the upper respiratory tract, that is, the nose and sinuses. Both SARS-CoV and SARS-CoV-2, however, are capable of invading deep into the lungs, something that is associated with more severe disease.

One possible reason for this is that the virus binds to the ACE-2 receptor on human cells in order to gain entry. This receptor is present in ciliated epithelial cells in the upper and lower airway, as well as in type II pneumocytes, which reside in the alveoli in the lower airway and produce lung-lubricating proteins. The type II pneumocytes are . . . important for lung function, so this is part of why the lower respiratory disease can be so severe, notes Gralinksi.

The new coronavirus also appears to use the ACE-2 receptor, which may help partially explain why, like SARS, it is more deadly than the other four coronaviruses. Those pathogens use different receptors, except for NL63, which also uses the ACE-2 receptor but binds to it with less affinity, says Gralinski. (MERS is thought to use an entirely different receptor, which is also present in the lower airways.)

To understand these questions fully will take time, research, and consistent funding for long-term studies. Coronavirus funding has been criticized for following a boom-and-bust cycle; viral spillovers from animals to people cause an initial surge of interest that tends to wane until the next outbreak occurs, Rasmussen warns.

Im hopeful that in this case it will be really apparent to everybody in the world that we need to be funding this type of basic science, fundamental science, to understand these mechanisms of disease, she says. Otherwise, were going to be in the same situation when the next outbreak happenswhether its a coronavirus or something else.

Katarina Zimmer is a New Yorkbased freelance journalist. Find her on Twitter@katarinazimmer.

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Why Some COVID-19 Cases Are Worse than Others - The Scientist

Improving efficiency, optimizing technology, increasing awareness, even reducing costs and time, these are all traits that result from strategic road maps, and in the case of bioprinting, where the outcomes affect tissue engineering, bespoke outcomes for patients, regenerative therapy, and much more, having a blueprint for the entire industry seems like a bright idea. Especially when this blueprint highlights some of the challenges on the way to achieving meaningful and innovative scientific development.

Published in IOP Sciences Biofabrication Journal, The Bioprinting Roadmap features advances in selected applications of bioprinting and highlights the status of current developments and challenges, as well as envisioned advances in science and technology. The roadmap brings together researchers, specialists, and physicians from a myriad of universities, institutions, and hospitals around the world, combining their knowledge to focus on different aspects of bioprinting technology. These include: Jrgen Groll, professor of functional materials in medicine and dentistry at the University of Wrzburgin Germany; Binil Starly, professor of mechanical engineering at North Carolina State University; Andrew Daly, an orthopedic surgeon at Emory University Hospital; Jason Burdick, a bioengineer from the University of Pennsylvania; Gregor Skeldon, a life science medical writer at Maverex, in the UK; Wenmiao Shu, professor of biomedical engineering at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow; Dong-woo Cho, mechanical engineer at Pohang University of Science and Technology; Vladimir A. Mironov, chief scientific officer of 3D Bioprinting Solutions, and many more.

The roadmap focuses on a broad spectrum of topics, in a detailed and readable fashion that showcases broad knowledge of the field by its authors, as well as a great deal of research that went into the making of the guide. The paper is categorized into the following sections:

The introduction of the research work was in charge of Wei Sun, chair professor of the College of Engineering from Drexel University, in Philadelphia, and Tsinghua Universityin Beijing, China, who said to IOP Publishing that there are a number of challenges to overcome, including the need for a new generation of novel bioinks with multi-functional properties to better transport, protect and grow cells during and after printing; better printing processes and printers to deliver cells with high survivability and high precision; efficient and effective crosslinking techniques and crosslinkers to maintain the structure integrity and stability after printing; integration with microfluidic devices to provide a long term and a simulated physiological environment to culture printed models.

Wei Sun (Credit: Drexel University)

Due to the rapid advancements in bioprinting techniques and their wide-ranging applications, the direction in which the field should advance is still evolving, Sun went on. The roadmap aims to address this unmet need by providing a comprehensive summary and recommendations, useful to experienced researchers and newcomers to the field alike.

The research sheds light on the main roadblocks to overcome in the future. The specialists consider that the next technologies will use multiple modalities in one single platform and novel processes, such as cell aggregate bioprinting techniques to create scalable, structurallystable, and perfusable tissue constructs. But in the meantime the challenges that remain are many. In his introduction, Sun talks about the need for a new generation of novel bioninks with multifunctional properties to better transport, protect, and grow cells during and after printing; better printing processes and printers to deliver cells with high survivability and high precision; efficient and effective crosslinking techniques and crosslinkers to maintain bioink structural integrity and stability after printing, and integration with microfluidic devices to provide a long-term and a simulated physiological environment in which to culture printed models.

Other researchers highlighted the importance of further improving bioreactor-based cell-expansion systems to lower barriers to the adoption of bioprinting in regenerative medicine and tissue engineering product markets. While Skeldon and Shu suggest that stem cell bioprinting can be realized if scientists find a way to reduce the shear stress of bioprinting stem cells.

Another obstruction is the high production costs and the difficulty of having large-scale production of organoids. Jinah Jang and Dong-Woo Cho from the Pohang University of Science and Technology suggest that there have been remarkable advances to the recreation of vasculatures and large organs even though challenges remain immense.

Whereas some of the highlights of the research include novel benefits from bioprinting in space, considering that microgravity conditions enable 3D bioprinting of tissue and organ constructs of more complex geometries with voids, cavities, and tunnels; cell expansion as a critical upstream process step for cell and tissue manufacturing; the great promise of stem cells in biomedical research and applications, which through bioprinting, can be particularly positioned in 3D in relation to other cell types and/or biomaterials, as well as progress in stem cell biology andin vitro culture which is opening up new doors to regenerative medicine and better physiological cell-based assays for disease models.

With so many advances in bioprinting around the world and remaining challenges to overcome, both seasoned researchers and newcomers will find an interesting and complete summary of the bioprinting industry. This game plan can help researchers come together to create new novel processes and fill in current technological gaps, as the researchers suggest.

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The Future of Bioprinting Research Has a New Road Map - 3DPrint.com

ORLANDO, Fla.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Amnion of Florida, a leading provider of alternative medicine utilizing cryopreserved placental cell allograft and advanced bioactive facial rejuvenation, is pleased to announce their vendor choice to round out regenerative anti-aging therapies.

Amnion announces a partnership with Merakris Therapeutics, LLC to advance the development of Merakris topical bioactive anti-aging hydrogel technology. Christopher Broderick, President, and Founder of Merakris Therapeutics stated, dedication to science-based outcomes is our primary focus, thus were delighted to be selected based upon our scientific approach to youth maintenance and rejuvenation technologies.

Amnion is focused on attracting women and men seeking affordable non-surgical options for youth maintenance via cell activated procedures, hair restoration, joint repair, dermal rejuvenation, and anti-aging treatments.

Our team of experienced medical professionals and aestheticians at Amnion are excited to utilize the Merakris Therapeutics product suite, including medical-grade, sterile filtered amniotic fluid serums and hydrogels at our newest Spa in Sanford, FL, said Eusebio Coterillo, President of Amnion.

In a constantly changing field, Amnion of Florida, under the guidance of the on-site medical staff, provides the highest level of quality products and procedures in cosmetic medicine. They offer cutting edge treatments that are proven by research, the use FDA cleared or registered products, and are widely published and peer endorsed.

More about Amnion of Florida

Amnion of Florida, based in Central Florida, is a leading provider of alternative medicine using cryopreserved placental cell transplants or allografts, processed from donated cellular birth tissue, which are natural alternatives to autologous regenerative medicine products. The primary function of our allogeneic regenerative treatments is to promote soft tissue joint/skin repair and regeneration mediated by growth factors and cells naturally found in placental tissue. These treatments have shown safety and efficacy in treating a variety of ailments including osteoarthritis, chronic ulcerative wounds, joint pain, skin rejuvenation, hair restoration, urinary incontinence, and ED. Learn more http://www.amnion.us.

More about Merakris Therapeutics, LLC

Merakris Therapeutics, based in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, is focused on researching, developing, and marketing regenerative healthcare products. Merakris is pioneering commercially scalable biotherapeutic technologies derived from stem cells that have various clinical applications. Our vision is to improve global patient care and outcomes through the pioneering and innovation of acellular regenerative biotechnologies. Learn more at http://www.merakris.com.

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Top Florida Medical Spa, Amnion of Florida, Partners With Merakris Therapeutics to Advance Their Non-Surgical Treatment Options - Business Wire

The global synthetic stem cells market was valued at approximately USD +14 million in 2019 and is expected to generate around USD +42 million by 2027, at a CAGR of around +19% between 2019 and 2027.

Synthetic stem cells offer therapeutic benefits comparable to those from natural stem cells and could reduce some of the risks associated with stem cell therapies. Additionally, these cells have better preservation stability and the technology is generalizable to other types of stem cells.

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The overviews, SWOT analysis and strategies of each vendor in the Synthetic Stem Cell market provide understanding about the market forces and how those can be exploited to create future opportunities.

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Synthetic Stem Cells Market reports provides 5 year pre-historic and forecast for the sector and include data on socio-economic data of global. Key stakeholders can consider statistics, tables & figures mentioned in this report for strategic planning which lead to success of the organization. Synthetic Stem Cells Market reports provides a comprehensive overview of the global market size and share.

The report also contains market revenue; sales, Synthetic Stem Cells Market production and manufacturing cost that could help you get a better view on the market. The Report Focuses on the key global Synthetic Stem Cells manufacturers, to define, describe and analyse the sales volume, value, market share, market competition landscape, SWOT analysis and development plans in next few years.

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Synthetic Stem Cells Market Is Expecting Revolutionary Growth 2019 with Top Key Players: North Carolina State University (NCSU), Zhengzhou University...

By the time he called the Lung Health Institute, Ed Garbutt was desperate. The Dallas computer-parts salesman could barely walk the length of his house without gasping for breath. Unable to work, Garbutt, 64, was going broke paying for trips to the emergency room.

Lung Health Institute staffers were reassuring, Garbutt recalled, telling him that more than 80% of their patients with lung disease said they found relief through their stem-cell treatments which would cost him $5,500, thanks to a summer sale. He said they told him that if he didnt have the money, he could get it other ways, like fundraising on GoFundMe.

So Garbutt raised $1,500 in donations, tapped the last of his savings and charged the rest on his credit card. I spent every dime I had, he said, hoping it would make a difference.

Over the past decade, hundreds of clinics have sprouted across the United States selling stem-cell therapies for incurable conditions such as Garbutts lung disease, Parkinsons disease and macular degeneration. But often, patients say, the only thing affected is their finances.

Former patients of the Tampa-based Lung Health Institute said they were encouraged to take out bank loans or borrow money from family members. Some withdrew from their retirement accounts and took up church offerings. Others borrowed against their homes.

What theyre doing is taking a predatory approach to people with progressive, fatal diseases, said Gregory Cosgrove, chief medical officer for the Pulmonary Fibrosis Foundation. His foundation issued a warning this year against such stem-cell therapies, noting that desperate patients continue to succumb to an onslaught of marketing and branding.

Even in a booming industry long denounced by medical experts, the Lung Health Institute has been singled out for its aggressive marketing and unproven claims. In 2015, for example, pulmonologists at Johns Hopkins wrote to the Food and Drug Administration urging it to take action against the Lung Health Institute. We would ask that the FDA take necessary action to prevent the further advertising of this unproven treatment, their letter read.

Since 2013, the company has conducted a multimillion-dollar campaign to lure patients with targeted online ads, hyped claims and high-pressure seminars, according to internal documents and former staff members.

In interviews, former employees responsible for fielding patients calls said they were given monthly sales quotas. Former company doctors and nurses described working as closers, using their medical credentials to persuade wavering patients to put money down.

In two lengthy interviews, the companys chief operating officer, Ann Sells Miller, defended the company, saying its treatments have helped many patients who have no other options. Miller and other executives dismissed complaints about their marketing strategies and treatments, saying their critics are often people who dont understand their stem-cell procedures or lawyers looking to make money by filing lawsuits against them.

Our patients come to us. We dont call them. They come to us because their current standard of care is not working for them, Miller said. She said the companys marketing is intended to educate people with the disease.

The reason the company offers financial tips, Miller said, is to make sure that patients understand what their treatment options are and to discuss the associated finances with it.

FDA considers many stem-cell treatments illegal

The FDA has not approved most stem-cell treatments and has said it considers many of them illegal. Miller and other officials at Lung Health Institute said they believe their treatment doesnt require FDA approval. Nevertheless, the company now plans to apply to the FDA for approval, said Marc Scheineson, the companys lawyer, even though this is a long, expensive and arduous process This action distinguishes LHI from the bulk of the other providers of stem cell and related blood-based therapies.

This article is based on documents obtained by The Washington Post, including internal memos, telephone scripts, emails and financial records. The Post also interviewed 14 former employees of the Lung Health Institute, including marketers, doctors, nurses and patient coordinators, whose job is to talk to potential customers. All were approached separately and spoke on the condition of anonymity; most said they were required to sign nondisclosure agreements and feared that the company would sue them for speaking out.

Their assertions were corroborated by The Post using documents and accounts from patients such as Garbutt and in some cases confirmed by the company itself.

A year and half after receiving treatments at the Lung Health Institute, Garbutts health has gotten worse. He can no longer shop or cook. He uses his monthly Social Security disability check to pay someone to make his meals.

Meanwhile, he is still struggling to pay off a $3,000 credit card bill from the procedure.

I maxed out my credit card to pay for the stem cells. I dont know how Ill pay it back, he said. Im just trying to take it one day at a time.

The story of Laser Spine and its Lung Health Institute offspring

The Lung Health Institute which operates clinics in Florida, Arizona, Texas, Tennessee and Pennsylvania and has treated, by its own count, more than 5,800 people began in many ways as the offspring of another company: the Laser Spine Institute.

Laser Spine was co-founded in 2005 by James St. Louis, an osteopath and orthopedic surgeon who offered a minimally invasive alternative to traditional neck and back surgery. As Laser Spine grew into a nationwide chain, with ubiquitous cable TV ads, it claimed to have a 98% patient satisfaction rate.

But the company was also the subject of dozens of malpractice lawsuits. In 2011, nine surgeons interviewed by Bloomberg Businessweek said many surgeries by Laser Spine were unnecessary or inappropriate. In response, Laser Spine officials at the time cited in-house surveys showing patient satisfaction. In 2014, a competitor sued Laser Spine, accusing it of using illegal marketing practices such as offering free airfare and hotels to persuade Medicare patients to sign up for procedures. Laser Spine officials denied the allegations in court, and the case has not been resolved.

This year, Laser Spine abruptly shuttered its business after banks froze its assets amid multiple lawsuits.

Laser Spines chief operating officer for some years was St. Louiss son, Jimmy St. Louis III. In 2011, the son left his fathers company and founded what would become the Lung Health Institute, using capital raised from some of his fathers investors, according to an early email to investors. Jimmy St. Louis also enlisted his dad as the Lung Health Institutes chief medical officer.

In an interview last year at its Tampa, Florida, headquarters, the younger St. Louis said he started the Lung Health Institute not to make money, but because he lost grandparents to lung disease.

There hasnt been any movement in this space really in 30 years, he said. Its an area of medicine thats been largely neglected.

A former employee who worked at Laser Spine and followed St. Louis to the Lung Health Institute before leaving the company for another job said, He took the Laser Spine business and marketing and made an exact carbon copy. The only thing we did different was swap out the product stem cells instead of spine surgery.

Lung clinics typical customer: elderly people with incurable disease

The Lung Health Institute developed a marketing profile of its typical customer: elderly patients suffering from incurable lung diseases who need supplemental oxygen and are not able to leave home easily and therefore spend hours online, said former employees.

Early on, the companys marketers bought ads on search engines such as Google and Bing so its website would appear prominently whenever anyone searched for cure and treatment for illnesses such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, said three former marketing team members.

They bought ads on solitaire and blackjack sites popular among older patients, the former marketers said, and if a city was hit by a snowstorm, they would quickly buy more search ads in that location, knowing patients on oxygen tanks would be homebound. And they targeted cities with direct flights to their clinic locations, knowing that patients on oxygen often struggled to travel with their equipment, former marketers said.

Patients who attended seminars held by the company said they were offered discounts if they put down a deposit on the spot.

In a statement, the company said its marketing strategy focuses on patient education and advocacy through several platforms, such as our website, online seminars.

The ads generated hundreds of leads each month as patients called, emailed or clicked for more information, internal budget documents show. Those in charge of converting the leads into sales were called patient coordinators.

Former coordinators said they were given a minimum quota of 10 sales each month. And as recently as last year, coordinators got paid only if they made a sale, working purely on commission, according to Miller, the companys COO. In recent months, the company has returned to the practice of giving coordinators a base salary in addition to their commission, Miller said. She disputed former coordinators assertions that they were given firm quotas, saying that like any healthy organization, we have to have projections.

According to a 2013 marketing script, if patients asked whether the treatments were approved by the Food and Drug Administration, coordinators were taught to respond: While the treatments are not FDA approved all of the drugs and equipment we use are FDA-approved.

If patients asked why insurance wouldnt cover the procedure, the script told coordinators to answer: I am sure that one day it will, however right now we want to provide treatment to those who want it.

If patients asked whether the treatments would work on them, coordinators were taught to point to a handful of patient testimonials.

Several patient coordinators said they were troubled by these calls. Some people wouldnt have that much money, and youre doing everything you can to convince them to use it on something youre not sure even works, said a woman who worked at the Lung Health Institute two years and left for another company after she said she became uncomfortable with the job. People would call afterward and say, I trusted you, but I dont feel any better. Some would call just to yell: I spent all this money, and you guys said this and that. You sold me fake medicine. Often Id need a drink by the end of the day.

Patients urged to beg, borrow, and crowdfund their treatment

When patients couldnt afford the procedure, the company frequently urged them to find other sources of money, according to its own website.

A November 2017 company blog post explained that some patients have turned to relatives for a loan or a gift, while others have held bake sales, garage/yard sales, walkathons, potlucks and raffles. The blog also suggested obtaining a fixed-term loan with monthly payments.

Crowdfunding was a frequent suggestion. A 2018 study found that more than 13,000 people had made donations for stem-cell treatment campaigns listed on two crowdfunding platforms as of December 2017.

Almost a third of all those campaigns were related to the Lung Health Institute. No one goes as far as they do in actively and explicitly pushing their patients to crowdfund and fundraise, said Leigh Turner, the studys co-author and a bioethicist at the University of Minnesota, who is serving as a pro bono expert witness in a lawsuit against the company.

Lung Health Institute COO Miller said, We dont track information as far as how many patients use fundraising efforts or financing efforts in order to come here.

GoFundMe has policies that prohibit fundraising for therapies considered illegal by a regulatory body. But last year, GoFundMes company blog included an upbeat post touting stem-cell treatments offered by for-profit clinics.

Patients can find a number of clinics that promise to relieve pain or help regain declining motor skills, all with a single stem-cell injection, the blog said. Hundreds of conditions fall under this umbrella, with promises of curing blood disorders like sickle cell anemia, to autoimmune diseases like multiple sclerosis.

After The Post asked about the blog post, GoFundMe took it down. The company said it also launched an audit of content on its website. But months later, the site continues to host thousands of campaigns raising money for stem-cell treatments, including more than a hundred that mention the Lung Health Institute by name.

Former patient Tammy Rivero, who is 62 and lives on an $800 monthly disability check, said in court testimony that a patient coordinator persuaded her to borrow against her home at the end of a dirt road in Hildebran, North Carolina.

Since receiving the treatment in 2015, however, Riveros illness has gotten much worse. Doctors say she now needs a double lung transplant to survive, which would be covered by Medicare and Medicaid. But Rivero doesnt have the money to rent an apartment near the transplant center for months of mandatory pre- and post-surgery rehabilitation. That would cost about $7,000, Rivero said the same amount she paid the Lung Health Institute.

Im going to pass away for $7,000, she said.

Rivero and another former patient have filed a lawsuit accusing the Lung Health Institute of deceptive marketing practices, and more than 30 other former patients or their representatives are seeking to join them in a proposed class-action lawsuit, said their lawyer, Ben Vinson. Among them is Tom Johnston, a Michigan man who recalls the excitement of his wife, Judy, upon seeing one of the companys online ads.

Tom Johnston, a retired pipe welder, said clinic staffers told his wife she would no longer need her oxygen tank after the procedure.

His wife died a year later, Johnston said, still haunted by the cost. She kept apologizing to me for spending our money. I said, We spent it together.

In court filings, the Lung Health Institute has denied the allegations of deceptive and unfair practices. In a statement the company pointed out that all patients sign an informed- consent form, which warns that the treatment might not improve their conditions.

As with any medicine, there are no guarantees, the company said.

No longer touting stem cells, its now platelet-rich plasma platelet-concentrate

The companys descriptions of its procedure have evolved over the years, but the basic premise has remained the same: extract blood from patients, spin it in a centrifuge to isolate stem cells or platelet-rich plasma platelet-concentrate, then reintroduce those using an IV into the patients bloodstream, where they naturally find their way to damaged parts of the lung and heal them.

Lung disease experts say there is no evidence such treatments work.

National medical groups including the American Lung Association and COPD Foundation have warned against such stem-cell treatments.

Miller said the Lung Health Institute has never been contacted by the FDA. She noted that its clinics have never had to report a serious adverse event. And she said that out of the 5,800 patients the company has treated in total, very few have filed lawsuits.

In 2016, the company self-published a white paper on its website that said almost 85% of patients say they experienced improvements in quality of life. Since then, the company has presented similar data in academic conference presentations and articles.

But unlike many medical studies, the Lung Health Institutes do not include a control group of patients who received a placebo. And all of its data, except for a one-page conference presentation, relied on follow-up phone surveys with patients rather than physical measurements, such as pulmonary function tests. The companys own researchers acknowledged the limitations of the data, concluding in one report: There is a very real possibility that response may simply be a placebo effect.

A stem-cell researcher, Arnold Caplan hired by the Lung Health Institute to testify in court as its expert said he found the data convincing.

The truth is, I dont exactly know how [the treatments] work, said Caplan, a biologist at Case Western Reserve University. But after seeing the phone surveys conducted by the company, he said, The important point for me is, there are clearly statistically relevant and positive outcomes from these treatments.

But three leading pulmonologists with no connection to the company or to any legal action said they found the data unconvincing and flawed, given its lack of comparative groups and placebo controls and other methodological problems.

Its borderline propaganda to suggest this information is evidence of efficacy, said Cosgrove, a pulmonologist at National Jewish Health in Denver, which runs one of the worlds largest interstitial lung disease programs.

The companys claims are a nothing, a come on, said Michael Matthay, a pulmonologist and stem-cell researcher at the University of California at San Francisco. Those statements are not supported by any medical data or medical studies.

There has never been a randomized trial for this treatments effect on lung diseases, said Marilyn Glassberg Csete, an expert in lung diseases and stem-cell therapies at the University of Miami. Theres no data.

Some patients said they felt better after the cellular procedures.

During a reporters visit to the Lung Health Institutes Tampa offices, company executives arranged interviews with two patients Larry Wood, 71, and Marie Hilton, 74 who said the treatment improved their breathing.

Before the infusion, Hilton said, I couldnt go grocery shopping I couldnt clean my house or vacuum without oxygen. She said she was able to stop using an oxygen tank after her $12,000 treatment last year.

Wood said he paid $6,500 for the procedure in 2014 after being offered a discount at a company seminar. I found within about three weeks I had improved lung function, he said. But the improvements only lasted about 10 months, he said, and he now pays $1,500 every three to four months for booster treatments.

Researchers said anecdotes like that are what make clinical trials so important. You want to rule out things like placebo effects, Cosgrove said. If you as a patient paid $10,000 for treatment, youre going to want it to work. You may even start taking care of yourself better to try to make it work. There are all sorts of factors that you need to control for.

Google cracks down and sales leads drop

The FDA has made clear that selling unapproved stem-cell therapies is illegal and won a recent lawsuit barring a prominent clinic from offering a treatment based on fat cells. After the FDA started cracking down on fat-based stem-cell treatments, the Lung Health Institute stopped selling them and focused on selling its blood-based treatments.

Company executives said they made the change not to avoid regulation, but because they felt the blood-based treatment was less invasive.

In summer 2017, Google suddenly stopped permitting the Lung Health Institute to buy search engine ads, a crucial source of sales leads, according to five former employees.

When asked by The Post about its actions related to Lung Health Institutes ads, Google declined to comment. In a statement, the company said: If we find ads that violate our policies, we take immediate action, which can include taking down violating ads or suspending an account altogether.

Lung Health Institute officials denied that they did anything wrong and said Google began to update its internal policy and rules for advertising related to regenerative medicine. Company officials said, [We] hold ourselves to the highest standards and will continue to evolve to stay within guidelines.

The result was a sharp drop in sales leads. They told us to start calling back every one of our old leads, to hand out discounts and offer booster treatments to past patients, one former coordinator said. We didnt know if we were going to survive.

Around the same time, the company changed its name. For years, it had been called the Lung Institute, but in 2017, the company inserted the word Health and moved to a new main website thelunghealthinstitute.com. Former employees said the rebranding solved some of the search engine and ad problems. Company officials said it was done to reflect expanded services.

In September of this year, Google announced a policy barring ads for unproven or experimental medical techniques such as most stem cell therapy. Google said it was taking the step after seeing a rise in bad actors attempting to take advantage of individuals by offering untested, deceptive treatments.

Amid growing scrutiny and regulation of stem-cell clinics, the Lung Health Institute made another change last year, removing all mention of stem cells from its website. The company now calls its procedure cellular therapy and platelet-rich plasma platelet-concentrate, or PRP-PC. Company officials said that their procedure hasnt changed, and that they still believe their treatment contains stem cells. They said their language change reflects how regenerative medicine has evolved.

The move, however, came after the FDA issued tougher regulations making clear most stem-cell therapies being sold are illegal and promising to crack down on bad actors.

Attorney Scheineson, a former top FDA official who now represents the Lung Health Institute, said in an interview that because the companys sole treatment now is PRP-PC, it isnt subject to stem-cell regulations and instead is governed by rules for blood banks.

FDA officials declined to talk about Lung Institute, but have said in recent months that their agency has struggled to regulate an industry that is rapidly expanding and morphing.

FDA officials said in general that PRP isnt covered by the same regulations as stem cells. But they also said that using a device such as a centrifuge to manufacture PRP for an unproven medical use such as treating COPD may still require review by the FDA. The FDA has never approved the use of a centrifuge for COPD, they said.

In addition, generally if a product is described as something that can treat a disease, then it is subject to much tougher regulation, according to FDA experts.

When you start saying it will improve COPD, thats an intended use that, from FDAs perspective, would require a higher degree of regulation, said Mark Schwartz, an attorney who served as deputy director in FDAs Office of Compliance and Biologics Quality between 2012 and 2015.

The company said it plans to begin the application process with the FDA for conducting a clinical trial and getting FDA approval needed for its stem-cell treatment. At the same time, the company said, it will keep selling its treatment even as it makes its FDA application.

Meanwhile, Lung Health Institute executives have made plans to expand. Late last year, the Lung Health Institute was acquired by Medovex, a medical technology products company run by former Laser Spine executive Bill Horne. In April, the company raised $7.2 million in new capital, and in recent weeks it raised another $6 million. Horne has said he plans to open more Lung Health Institute clinics.

In July, Medovex announced that it was changing its name to H-CYTE and had entered into a business partnership with a startup called Rion run by two researchers from the prestigious Mayo Clinic to develop a new proprietary cellular platform to treat COPD.

In news releases, the company said the two researchers Atta Behfar and Andre Terzic, who research regenerative medicine at Mayo had joined its board of directors.

When reached by phone, Behfar said he was unaware that patients have accused the Lung Health Institute of deceptive marketing and sued the company he was partnering with. To be perfectly frank, I dont have much awareness in regards to what Lung Health Institute has done, he said.

Behfar said the goal of the partnership is to test a new cellular treatment for COPD different from the one the Lung Health Institute currently sells using FDA-sanctioned clinical trials. The new treatment will not be sold to patients until its proved effective by rigorous science, Behfar said.

Contrary to the news releases, however, the two Mayo researchers never agreed to serve on the board of directors, according to Behfar and Rions chief administrative officer, Mike Pfenning. Weve asked them to issue a retraction to correct that, Pfenning said. They just agreed to serve in an unpaid advisory role.

In an interview this fall, Miller chief operating officer for H-CYTE and the Lung Health Institute insisted that Terzic and Behfar were indeed members of her companys board of directors. But in a news release this month, the company said the two doctors had resigned from the board of directors and instead become scientific advisers.

Miller said the company hopes to sell the new treatment it is developing initially to COPD patients. But they plan to expand that business model and sell it eventually to many more patients suffering from a whole range intractable diseases.

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Clinic pitches unproven treatments to desperate patients, with tips on raising the cash - Seattle Times

vTv Therapeutics Inc. (NASDAQ:VTVT) and Asterias Biotherapeutics Inc. (:) are two firms in the Biotechnology that compete against each other. Below is a comparison of their institutional ownership, analyst recommendations, profitability, risk, dividends, earnings and valuation.

Valuation and Earnings

We can see in table 1 the earnings per share, top-line revenue and valuation of vTv Therapeutics Inc. and Asterias Biotherapeutics Inc.

Profitability

Table 2 provides the return on equity, net margins and return on assets of the two firms.

Analyst Ratings

In next table is delivered vTv Therapeutics Inc. and Asterias Biotherapeutics Inc.s ratings and recommendations.

vTv Therapeutics Inc. has a 224.68% upside potential and a consensus target price of $5.

Insider & Institutional Ownership

The shares of both vTv Therapeutics Inc. and Asterias Biotherapeutics Inc. are owned by institutional investors at 7.3% and 13.75% respectively. 69.32% are vTv Therapeutics Inc.s share owned by insiders. Insiders Competitively, owned 40.53% of Asterias Biotherapeutics Inc. shares.

Performance

Here are the Weekly, Monthly, Quarterly, Half Yearly, Yearly and YTD Performance of both pretenders.

Summary

vTv Therapeutics Inc. beats Asterias Biotherapeutics Inc. on 6 of the 9 factors.

vTv Therapeutics Inc., a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company, discovers, develops, and sells orally administered small molecule drug candidates worldwide. The companys drug candidate for the treatment of Alzheimers disease comprise azeliragon (TTP488), an orally administered, small molecule antagonist targeting the receptor for advanced glycation endproducts, which is in Phase III clinical trials. Its type 2 diabetes drug candidates include TTP399, an orally administered, liver-selective glucokinase activator that has been completed Phase IIb clinical trials; and TTP273, an orally administered, non-peptide agonist that targets the glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor, which is in Phase II clinical trials. The company has a license and research agreement with Calithera Biosciences, Inc. to develop and commercialize its hexokinase II inhibitors for therapeutics, prophylactic, preventative, or diagnostic use. vTv Therapeutics Inc. was founded in 2015 and is headquartered in High Point, North Carolina. vTv Therapeutics Inc. operates as a subsidiary of M&F TTP Holdings Two LLC.

Asterias Biotherapeutics, Inc., a clinical-stage biotechnology company, focuses on developing and commercializing novel therapies in the fields of cell therapy and regenerative medicine. The company develops therapeutic products in the areas of neurology and oncology. Its clinical stage programs include AST-OPC1, a therapy derived from pluripotent stem cells that has completed a Phase I clinical trial for the treatment of thoracic spinal cord injuries; and that is in Phase I/IIa clinical trial for treating cervical spinal cord injuries, as well as for the treatment of multiple sclerosis and white matter stroke. The company also develops immunotherapeutic programs, such as AST-VAC1, an autologous product candidate that has completed a Phase II clinical trial for the treatment of acute myelogenous leukemia; and AST-VAC2, which is in a Phase I/IIa clinical trial, an allogeneic and cancer vaccine candidate designed to stimulate patient immune responses to telomerase. The company was formerly known as BioTime Acquisition Corporation and changed its name to Asterias Biotherapeutics, Inc. in March 2013. Asterias Biotherapeutics, Inc. was founded in 2012 and is headquartered in Fremont, California. Asterias Biotherapeutics, Inc. is a subsidiary of BioTime, Inc.

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Reviewing vTv Therapeutics Inc. (VTVT)'s and Asterias Biotherapeutics Inc. (:)'s results - MS Wkly

Both BioCryst Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ:BCRX) and Brainstorm Cell Therapeutics Inc. (NASDAQ:BCLI) are each others competitor in the Biotechnology industry. Thus the compare of their institutional ownership, earnings and valuation, profitability, risk, dividends, analyst recommendations.

Earnings & Valuation

Demonstrates BioCryst Pharmaceuticals Inc. and Brainstorm Cell Therapeutics Inc. earnings per share, gross revenue and valuation.

Profitability

Table 2 represents BioCryst Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ:BCRX) and Brainstorm Cell Therapeutics Inc. (NASDAQ:BCLI)s net margins, return on assets and return on equity.

Volatility and Risk

A 2.02 beta means BioCryst Pharmaceuticals Inc.s volatility is 102.00% more than Standard and Poors 500s volatility. Brainstorm Cell Therapeutics Inc.s 1.19 beta is the reason why it is 19.00% more volatile than Standard and Poors 500.

Liquidity

1.8 and 1.8 are the respective Current Ratio and a Quick Ratio of BioCryst Pharmaceuticals Inc. Its rival Brainstorm Cell Therapeutics Inc.s Current and Quick Ratios are 1 and 1 respectively. BioCryst Pharmaceuticals Inc. has a better chance of clearing its pay short and long-term debts than Brainstorm Cell Therapeutics Inc.

Analyst Ratings

The next table highlights the given recommendations and ratings for BioCryst Pharmaceuticals Inc. and Brainstorm Cell Therapeutics Inc.

BioCryst Pharmaceuticals Inc.s average price target is $16, while its potential upside is 580.85%. Meanwhile, Brainstorm Cell Therapeutics Inc.s average price target is $9, while its potential upside is 147.25%. Based on the analysts view we can conclude, BioCryst Pharmaceuticals Inc. is looking more favorable than Brainstorm Cell Therapeutics Inc.

Institutional & Insider Ownership

BioCryst Pharmaceuticals Inc. and Brainstorm Cell Therapeutics Inc. has shares owned by institutional investors as follows: 98.7% and 11.4%. Insiders owned roughly 0.2% of BioCryst Pharmaceuticals Inc.s shares. Comparatively, Brainstorm Cell Therapeutics Inc. has 0.6% of its share owned by insiders.

Performance

In this table we provide the Weekly, Monthly, Quarterly, Half Yearly, Yearly and YTD Performance of both pretenders.

For the past year BioCryst Pharmaceuticals Inc. had bearish trend while Brainstorm Cell Therapeutics Inc. had bullish trend.

Summary

BioCryst Pharmaceuticals Inc. beats on 7 of the 12 factors Brainstorm Cell Therapeutics Inc.

BioCryst Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a biotechnology company, designs, optimizes, and develops small molecule drugs that block key enzymes involved in the pathogenesis of diseases. The company markets peramivir, an intravenous neuraminidase inhibitor, which is approved for uncomplicated seasonal and acute influenza in the United States and Canada under the name RAPIVAB, in Japan and Taiwan as RAPIACTA, and in Korea as PERAMIFLU. It also has various ongoing development programs, including BCX7353 and second generation oral inhibitors of plasma kallikrein for hereditary angioedema; and galidesivir, a broad spectrum viral RNA polymerase inhibitor that is indicated to treat filoviruses, as well as forodesine, an oral purine nucleoside phosphorylase inhibitor for use in oncology. It has collaborative relationships with Mundipharma International Holdings Limited for the development and commercialization of forodesine; Shionogi & Co., Ltd. and Green Cross Corporation for the development and commercialization of peramivir in Japan, Taiwan, and South Korea; Seqirus UK Limited for the development and commercialization of RAPIVAB worldwide, except Japan, Taiwan, Korea, and Israel; and the University of Alabama at Birmingham for the development of influenza neuraminidase and complement inhibitors. BioCryst Pharmaceuticals, Inc. was founded in 1986 and is headquartered in Durham, North Carolina.

Brainstorm Cell Therapeutics Inc., a biotechnology company, develops adult stem cell therapies for neurodegenerative disorders that include amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, multiple sclerosis, Parkinsons disease, and others. The company holds rights to develop and commercialize its NurOwn technology through a licensing agreement with Ramot of Tel Aviv University Ltd. Its NurOwn technology is based on a novel differentiation protocol, which induces differentiation of the bone marrow-derived mesenchymal stem cells into neuron-supporting cells and secreting cells that release various neurotrophic factors, including glial-derived neurotrophic factor, brain-derived neurotrophic factor, vascular endothelial growth factor, and hepatocyte growth factor for the growth, survival, and differentiation of developing neurons. The company was formerly known as Golden Hand Resources Inc. and changed its name to Brainstorm Cell Therapeutics Inc. in November 2004 to reflect its new line of business in the development of novel cell therapies for neurodegenerative diseases. Brainstorm Cell Therapeutics Inc. was founded in 2000 and is headquartered in Hackensack, New Jersey.

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Reviewing BioCryst Pharmaceuticals Inc. (BCRX)'s and Brainstorm Cell Therapeutics Inc. (NASDAQ:BCLI)'s results - MS Wkly