Category Archives: Stem Cell Research

28 May 2012 Last updated at 09:14 ET

A 54m cutting-edge stem cell research centre in Edinburgh has been officially opened by the Princess Royal.

The Royal opened the Scottish Centre for Regenerative Medicine as well as the 24m bio-incubator facility, Nine, in the Edinburgh BioQuarter.

Research into conditions such as multiple sclerosis and heart and liver disease will benefit from the new facilities in Little France.

The Princess Royal unveiled plaques at the centres.

Edinburgh University's Scottish Centre for Regenerative Medicine is the first large-scale, purpose-built facility of its kind and provides accommodation for up to 250 stem cell scientists.

The centre, funded by Edinburgh University, Scottish Enterprise, the Medical Research Council (MRC) and the British Heart Foundation through its Mending Broken Hearts Appeal, is being opened by the Princess Royal in her role as Chancellor of Edinburgh University.

It includes the most up-to-date facilities in the UK, which meet the highest guidelines, to manufacture stem cell lines that could be used for patient therapies.

Nine, which has been jointly funded by Scottish Enterprise and the UK government's department for business, innovation and skills, has 85,000 sq ft of laboratory and office space for both established biotechnology companies and start-up ventures.

The Edinburgh BioQuarter is in the city's Little France area and includes the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh and Edinburgh University's Queen's Medical Research Institute and Chancellor's Building.

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Princess opens stem cell centre

San Diego scientists will receive about $18.1 million in the latest round of funding from the California Institute of Regenerative Medicine (CIRM), the agency that's distributing $3 billion in stem cell research money made available through Proposition 71.

Since funding began, San Diego County researchers have been awarded at least $258 million, making the region one of the largest stem cell research clusters in the country.

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Here's a sample of the latest grants:

Mark Tuszynski, UC San Diego, $4.7 million for research on novel stem cell therapies to treat spinal cord injuries.

Peter Schutlz, The Scripps Research Institute, $4.3 million for research to treat multiple sclerosis.

Juan Carlos Izpisua Belmonte, Salk Institute, $2.3 million for research that would help repair damaged blood vessels.

Yang Xu, UC San Diego, $1.8 million for research that would help treat heart failure.

Eric Adler, UC San Diego, $1.7 million for research to help treat Danon disease, which causes major abnormalities in heart and skeletal muscles.

David Schubert, Salk Institute, $1.7 million for research aimed at treating Alzheimer's disease

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SD scientists get $18 million in stem cell funds

SACRAMENTO California's stem cell agency today approved two grants to UC Davis Health System researchers for their innovative work in regenerative medicine.

Kyriacos A. Athanasiou, distinguished professor of orthopaedic surgery and professor and chair of biomedical engineering, and the Child Family Professor of Engineering at UC Davis, is investigating the use of skin-derived stem cells to heal cartilage injuries and debilitating conditions of the knee such as osteoarthritis.

W. Douglas Boyd, professor of surgery, plans to further refine a novel approach to treating cardiovascular injuries suffered during a heart attack by using stem cells and a tissue-like scaffold to repair cardiac damage.

The pair received individual grants totaling approximately $6.6 million from the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine's (CIRM) governing board.

Athanasiou's and Boyd's multi-year grants were among the proposals submitted to CIRM for its third round of Early Translational Awards, which are intended to enable clinical therapies to be developed more rapidly.

"Both of these scientists are conducting exciting research that could have far-reaching implications in health care," said Jan Nolta, director of the UC Davis Institute for Regenerative Cures and the university's stem cell program director. "Dr. Athanasiou is bioengineering new cartilage that could have the same physiological integrity as the cartilage a person is born with. Dr. Boyd is developing a treatment that uses a paper-thin patch embedded with stem cells to harness their regenerative powers to repair damaged heart muscle."

Boyd, who's a pioneering cardiothoracic surgeon, pointed out in his CIRM proposal that heart disease is the nation's number-one cause of death and disability. An estimated 16.3 million Americans over the age of 20 suffer from coronary heart disease, which in 2007 accounted for an estimated 1 in 6 deaths in the U.S. Boyd plans to use bone-marrow derived stem cells -- known as mesenchymal stem cells -- in combination with a bioengineered framework known as an extracellular matrix, to regenerate damaged heart tissue, block heart disease and restore cardiac function, something currently not possible except in cases of a complete and very invasive heart transplant.

An expert in biomedical engineering, Athanasiou is focusing on developing a cellular therapy using stem cells created from an individual's own skin -- known as autologous skin-derived stem cells -- which have shown great promise in animal models. He plans to use the new funding to conduct extensive toxicology and durability tests to determine the technique's long-term safety and efficacy. Such tests are among the many steps needed to advance toward human clinical trials.

Cartilage is the slippery tissue that covers the ends of bones in joints, allowing bones to glide over each other and absorbing the shock of movement. Cartilage defects from injuries and lifelong wear and tear can eventually degenerate into osteoarthritis. According to the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases, osteoarthritis is the most common form of arthritis and affects an estimated 27 million Americans over the age of 25.

"For anyone suffering from osteoarthritis or other debilitating cartilage conditions, Dr. Athanasiou's goal of using stem cells to regenerate new tissue could have enormous quality-of-life and economic benefits," said Nolta, who is the recipient of a prior translational grant from CIRM to develop potential therapies for Huntington's disease . "Dr. Boyd's work is equally promising because he's using a bioengineered structure to encourage cardiac tissue repair, which could have important benefits in the treatment of heart disease."

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State awards stem cell grants to medical researchers

Date: Friday May. 25, 2012 9:27 AM ET

CALGARY Calgary scientists say they have revolutionized stem cell production and have found a way to create the super cells without the risk of cancer.

A pair of researchers at the University of Calgary have created a device that allows them to produce millions of cells which can then be reprogrammed to make stem cells.

Dr. Derrick Rancourt and Dr. Roman Krawetz say they have perfected a new bioreactor technology that allows them to make millions of pluripotent stem cells much more quickly than ever before.

Pluripotent stem cells come from two main sources; embryos and adult cells that have been reprogrammed by scientists.

Scientists turn on four specific genes to reprogram the cells into stem cells which results in pluripotent stem cells or iPS cells.

Pluripotent stem cells have the potential to differentiate into almost any cell in the body.

"The even better news is, we made these stem cells without introducing the cancer gene at all," says Rancourt, co-author of the research, published in the May issue of the prestigious journal Nature Methods. "These stem cells are an outstanding alternative to embryonic stem cells."

Up until now, scientists were limited in their research because it usually takes one million adult cells to make a single stem cell and the resulting stem cells are much more likely to cause cancer.

"Scientists can make a whole mouse from iPS cells," says Krawetz. "The challenge they face is, within two years, the mouse gets cancer."

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Calgary scientists make stem cell breakthrough

Today, we have some awesome writings from seven (a factor of 42) equally awesome young or early-career science writers. Read about the science of oppressive urban environments, open science, the worlds first stem cell drug and more All here.

Rachel Nuwer, freelance science journalist, writes about a new research which aims to curtail oppressive urban environments in big cities, in Txchnologist. Oh, trees help.

Researchers Seek to Measure the Oppressiveness of Streetscapes

In the urban canyons, pedestrians shuffle in shadowed gullies carved between skyscrapers. Enclosed by hundreds of stories of steel and concrete, the hapless passersby feel the buildings loom over them like dark sentries. It may sound like a scene from Blade Runner, but some researchers are concerned that mega-cities like New York, Tokyo or Hong Kong darken more than pedestrian walkways. The built environment, some believe, may be an additional source of anxiety in an urbanites day-to-day life, as much as pressure from work and relationships.

Brett Szmajda, an editorial intern at Cosmos, writes about a speech-analysis software that can assess your stress levels for Cosmos Online.

Software to monitor your working memory

A nifty piece of software can now monitor workers and pick up on subtle cues about when they are not coping. The BrainGauge software, announced by Australian scientists at the CeBIT information and technology conference in Sydney, detects stress levels from vocal tones, and may improve worker retention rates in intense work environments such as air-traffic control, emergency services and call centres.

Victoria Charlton, at Imperial College London, UK, has a new blog post in her impressive I, Science blog, Science Means Business. This time, Victoria takes a look at open science. Her post starts with this sentence: Giving the public access to the research that they fund is about much more than eliminating journal pay-walls. A lede which will get you to read the whole post, Im sure.

Access Denied

Open access is a hot topic right now. For months, academics have been taking an uncharacteristic interest in the detailed financials of the publishing world, and, for many scientists, the fight for our right to party no, sorry, to access largely incomprehensible journal articles has taken on a revolutionary tone. Rumour has it, the mathematicians are revolting. (Against Dutch publisher Reed Elsevier, that is.) Now dont get me wrong, Im not against open access. Quite the opposite, actually. But, heretical though this may sound coming from a tax-paying science graduate and bona-fide member of the public, I do think were in danger of losing sight of the bigger picture on this one. Please, hear me out.

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Khalil's Picks (25 May 2012)

Five UC San Diego scientists have received almost $12 million combined from the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine to pay for stem cell-based research, the university announced today.

A team led by Lawrence Goldstein, of the Department of Cellular and Molecular Medicine and director of the UC San Diego Stem Cell Program, was given $1.8 million to continue looking for new methods to find and test possible medications for Alzheimer's disease, according to UCSD. They use reprogrammed stem cells in their work.

Dr. Mark Tuszynski, professor of neurosciences and director of the Center for Neural Repair, received $4.6 million to develop more potent stem cell-based treatments for spinal cord injuries.

Gene Yeo, assistant professor in the Department of Cellular and Molecular Medicine, was awarded $1.6 million to continue research into treatments for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. His research hopes to take advantage of recent discoveries about ALS, or Lou Gehrig's disease, which center on mutations in RNA-binding proteins that cause dysfunction and death in neurons.

Dr. Eric David Adler, an associate clinical professor of medicine and cardiologist, was granted $1.7 million to screen potential drugs for Danon disease, a type of inherited heart failure that frequently kills patients by their 20s.

Yang Xu, a professor in the Division of Biological Sciences, was given $1.8 million to research the use of human embryonic stem cells to produce a renewable source of heart muscle cells that replace cells damaged or destroyed by disease, while overcoming biological resistance to new cells.

"With these new awards, the (institute) now has 52 projects in 33 diseases at varying stages of working toward clinical trials,'' said Jonathan Thomas, chairman of the CIRM governing board. "Californians should take pride in being at the center of this worldwide research leading toward new cures.''

CIRM was established in November 2004 with voter passage of the California Stem Cell Research and Cures Act. UC San Diego has received $112 million since CIRM began providing grants six years ago.

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UC San Diego Scientists Net $12 Million For Stem Cell Research

DUARTE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--

City of Hope was granted a $5,217,004 early translational research award by the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) to support the development of a T cell-based immunotherapy that re-directs a patients own immune response against glioma stem cells. City of Hope has been awarded more than $49.7 million in grant support from CIRM since awards were first announced in 2006.

City of Hope is a pioneer in T cell immunotherapy research, helping to develop genetically modified T cells as a treatment for cancer. This strategy, termed adoptive T cell therapy, focuses on redirecting a patients immune system to specifically target tumor cells, and has the potential to become a promising new approach for treatment of cancer.

In this research, we are genetically engineering a central memory T cell that targets proteins expressed by glioma stem cells, said Stephen J. Forman, M.D., Francis and Kathleen McNamara Distinguished Chair in Hematology and Hematopoietic Cell Transplantation and director of the T Cell Immunotherapy Research Laboratory. Central memory T cells have the potential to establish a persistent, lifelong immunity to help prevent brain tumors from recurring.

The American Cancer Society estimates that more than 22,000 people in the U.S. will be diagnosed with a brain tumor this year, and 13,700 will die from the disease. Glioma is a type of brain tumor that is often difficult to treat and is prone to recurrence. Currently, less than 20 percent of patients with malignant gliomas are living five years after their diagnosis. This poor prognosis is largely due to the persistence of tumor-initiating cancer stem cells, a population of malignant cells similar to normal stem cells in that they are able to reproduce themselves indefinitely. These glioma stem cells are highly resistant to chemotherapy and radiation treatments, making them capable of re-establishing new tumors.

Researchers at City of Hope previously have identified several proteins as potential prime targets for the development of cancer immunotherapies, such as interleukin 13 receptor alpha 2, a receptor found on the surface of glioma cells, and CD19, a protein that is active in lymphoma and leukemia cells. Both investigational therapies are currently in phase I clinical trials. Forman is the principal investigator for the newly granted study which will develop a T cell that targets different proteins expressed by glioma stem cells. Christine Brown, Ph.D., associate research professor, serves as co-principal investigator, and Michael Barish, Ph.D., chair of the Department of Neurosciences, and Behnam Badie, M.D., director of the Brain Tumor Program, serve as co-investigators on the project.

Because cancer stem cells are heterogeneous, our proposed therapy will target multiple antigens to cast as wide a net as possible over this malignant stem cell population, said Brown.

While in this effort, we are targeting a neurological cancer, our approach will lead to future studies targeting other cancers, including those that metastasize to the brain, added Barish.

The CIRM grant will help us to build a targeted T cell therapy against glioma that can offer lasting protection, determine the best way to deliver the treatment, establish an efficient process to manufacture these T cells for treatment, and get approval for a human clinical trial, said Badie.

City of Hope is also a collaborative partner providing process development, stem cell-derived cell products and regulatory affairs support in two other CIRM-funded projects that received early translational research grants. Larry Couture, Ph.D., senior vice president of City of Hopes Sylvia R. & Isador A. Deutch Center for Applied Technology Development and director of the Center for Biomedicine & Genetics, is working with Stanford University and Childrens Hospital of Orange County Research Institute on their respective projects.

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City of Hope Receives $5 Million Grant to Develop T Cell Treatment Targeting Brain Tumor Stem Cells

Fat stem cells may help treat kidney ailments BS Reporter / Mumbai/ AhmedabadMarch 06, 2007 In a breakthrough in the stem cell research, scientist from Ahmedabad have developed a technique to encourage a new kind of stem cells called Mesenchymal stem cells generated from fat (adipose tissue) of donors, which can be used in treating kidney diseases. Mesenchymal stem cells generated from fat of donors hold great promise for the treatment of kidney diseases, claims H L Trivedi, director, Institute of Kidney Diseases and Research Center (IKDRC), Ahmedabad. We will soon patent the research, he added. The institute will soon convene a meeting of scientists working on the project and take a decision on securing the patent for the research. A team of scientists from the IKDRC, led by Trivedi, has clinically proved that when presented in the right physical context, certain growth factors encourage the survival and proliferation of fat mesenchymal stem cells grown outside the body. Trivedi says the research offers hope of cent per cent recovery for patients suffering from severe kidney diseases as the mesenchymal stem cells will nullify the rejection rate of the body, thus inducing the body to accept the newly transplanted kidney as part of its own body. Emphasising on the success of mesenchymal stem cells for kidney treatment, Trivedi further said mesenchymal stem cells were the best repair stem cells compared to other stem cells. The worlds first recipient of these kinds of stem cells is a kidney patient - Hetalben Mewada, a 30-year-old housewife from Palanpur in Gujarat, claims the scientist from IKDRC. Speaking about the financial aspect of the kidney treatment, Trivedi said, Mesenchymal stem cells using fat is simple and cheap. The latest invention would cut the cost of surgery drastically and make it affordable for the needy people. It will also reduce the chances of recurrence and complexity in the post surgery situation, he said. Mesenchymal stem cells are available in bone marrow and peripheral blood cells in smaller quantity, but the cells are not economically feasible. Mesenchymal stem cells can be easily derived from fat and is economically viable. Mesenchymal stem cells that are already in the fats are separated and grown through culturing technique in laboratory. IKDRCs scientists carried out a kidney transplant operation using Mesenchymal stem cells derived from fats along with adult hematopoietic stem cells infused into the transplanted kidney to create tolerance or acceptance by the patients. This eliminates the chance of rejection, and the patients would not need medication. Under this procedure, the mesenchymal stem cells act as a big brother to adult hematopoietic stem cells. Mesenchymal stem cells protect these hematopoietic stem cells and help their grafting into different organs by themselves getting grafted and making space for their younger siblings (adult hematopoietic stem cells) to live along with them in their vicinity. Fat stem cells may help treat kidney ailments BS Reporter / Mumbai/ Ahmedabad Mar 06, 2007, 22:52 IST

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Fat stem cells may help treat kidney ailments

Five scientists from the University of California, San Diego and its School of Medicine have been awarded almost $12 million in new grants from the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) to conduct stem cell-based research into regenerating spinal cord injuries, repairing gene mutations that cause amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and finding new drugs to treat heart failure and Alzheimer's disease.

The awards mark the third round of funding in CIRM's Early Translational Awards program, which supports projects that are in the initial stages of identifying drugs or cell types that could become disease therapies. More than $69 million in awards were announced yesterday, including funding for first-ever collaboratively funded research projects with China and the federal government of Australia.

"With these new awards, the agency now has 52 projects in 33 diseases at varying stages of working toward clinical trials," said Jonathan Thomas, JD, PhD and CIRM governing board chair. "Californians should take pride in being at the center of this worldwide research leading toward new cures. These projects represent the best of California stem cell science and the best international experts who, together, will bring new therapies for patients."

The five new UC San Diego awards are:

CIRM was established in November 2004 with the passage of Proposition 71, the California Stem Cell Research and Cures Act. The statewide ballot measure provided $3 billion in funding for stem cell research at California universities and research institutions and called for the establishment of an entity to make grants and provide loans for stem cell research, research facilities, and other vital research opportunities.

The May 24 grants bring UC San Diego's total to more than $112 million in CIRM funding since the first awards in 2006.

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5 scientists receive stem-cell research grants

24.05.2012 - (idw) Schwedischer Forschungsrat - The Swedish Research Council

A new technique that converts stem cells into brain cells has been developed by researchers at Lund University. The method is simpler, quicker and safer than previous research has shown and opens the doors to a shorter route to clinical cell transplants. By adding two different molecules, the researchers have discovered a surprisingly simple way of starting the stem cells journey to become finished brain cells. The process mimics the brains natural development by releasing signals that are part of the normal development process. Experiments in animal models have shown that the cells quickly adapt in the brain and behave like normal brain cells.

This technique allows us to fine-tune our steering of stem cells to different types of brain cells. Previous studies have not always used the signals that are activated during the brains normal development. This has caused the transplanted cells to develop tumours or function poorly in the brain, says Agnete Kirkeby, one of the authors of the study.

Since the method effectively imitates the brains own processes, it reduces the risk of tumour formation, one of the most common obstacles in stem cell research. The quick, simple technique makes the cells mature faster, which both makes the transplant safer and helps the cells integrate better into the brain. The results of the study bring stem cell research closer to transplant trials in the human brain.

The research is presented in the report Generation of regionally specified neural progenitors and functional neurons from human embryonic stem cells under defined conditions in the journal Cell Reports.

The study has been conducted as part of the EU 7th Framework Programme project NeuroStemcell.

For more information, please contact: Malin Parmar +46 709 823901, Malin.Parmar@med.lu.se Agnete Kirkeby +45 5168 5353, Agnete.Kirkeby@med.lu.se jQuery(document).ready(function($) { $("fb_share").attr("share_url") = encodeURIComponent(window.location); });

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From stem cell to brain cell new technique mimics the brain