Category Archives: Stem Cell Research

For the first time, researchers have used stem cells from a patient’s own heart to repair the damage to the muscle that occurs during heart attack.

Dr. Eduardo Marban, director of the Cedars Sinai Heart Institute, and his team report in the journal Lancet that 17 patients who received an injection of their own heart cells grown from their stem cells saw the scarring on their hearts shrivel by 50% over a year. Eight patients who received usual care had no change.

During a heart attack, some of the heart’s muscle is cut off from its oxygen supply, so within seconds these cells start to die. The body’s immune system treats the change like a trauma and begins to wall off the dying tissue, creating an ever-thickening layer of scarring; eventually, the scar tissue hampers the heart’s ability to pump blood efficiently throughout the body. Keeping this scarring to a minimum, or even reversing it is the Holy Grail of heart attack research: maintaining as much healthy and active heart muscle as possible increases patients’ chances of recovering quickly and completely.

“Heart disease is still the number one killer of men and women, so there is a dire need for new therapies to be tested,” says Dr. Deepak Srivastava, director of the Gladstone Institute Cardiovascular Disease, who is a leader in heart stem-cell research and was not involved in the current study. “I applaud them carrying through with a clinical trial, which is great.”

MORE: Stem Cell Miracle? New Therapies May Cure Chronic Conditions Like Alzheimer’s

The heart has a natural ability to fix minor defects by regenerating new muscle cells to replace dying ones. About 1% to 2% of heart cells die each year, and are replaced this way. This process can’t come close to regenerating the one-third of heart muscle that is typically affected by a heart attack, however, so Marban and his team decided to give the process a boost. The researchers extracted some of the naturally healing stem cells from the heart and nurtured them in a lab dish. The hope was to inject a large enough population of the cells back into the heart to trigger a broad-scale repair of the muscle after heart attack.

“We were gratified to see that the scars shrank in patients who had gotten the cells,” Marban says. “Not only that, but these patients also had a big increase in living heart muscle. The regeneration of living tissue, or regrowth of lost tissue, which is what we were able to achieve, is encouraging.”

All of the patients were enrolled in the trial within 1.5 months of having a heart attack, and had their hearts scanned with an MRI. Seventeen of the patients had a biopsy of their heart tissue so the researchers could extract the heart’s stem cells and expand them in the lab; the researchers then re-infusing 12 million to 25 million new heart cells into each patient’s heart artery 1.5 months to 3 months later. The control patients received standard care of medications and monitoring to recover from their heart attack.

At six months and again at one year into the study, Marban and his colleagues took additional MRIs of the patients’ hearts, to measure any changes in the size of their scar tissue. The patients who had received the heart cells showed markedly smaller scars and more living tissue over time, compared with those who received standard therapy. In fact, new tissue formation increased by 60% on average, compared with scar shrinkage.

Unfortunately, however, the patients did not show any change in heart function, as measured by the ejection fraction, or the ability of the heart to pump blood. In patients who got the stem cells, their ejection fraction went from 39% at the start of the study to 41% a year later; healthy hearts pump at about 50% or greater efficiency.

MORE: Rethinking the Framingham Score: Is There a Better Way to Predict Heart Disease?

But Marban isn’t discouraged by that, noting that although he wasn’t able to show that the heart functioned better overall in the stem-cell patients, he did find that in the areas where the scars had shrunk, the muscle appeared to be working more efficiently. “When you zoom in and look at regional function, there was big improvement,” he says. “We believe that the changes we see in the amount of scar tissue, even though it’s dramatic and unmistakable and significant, still aren’t enough to tilt the balance toward complete repair of the heart.”

Will it take more cells, or more time, or different types of cells to generate that type of complete repair? That’s impossible to tell from this study, but the results are encouraging enough to trigger more work into such cell-based treatments. “This is part of a series of important steps toward ultimately moving to cell-based therapy that will someday create new muscle in the heart,” says Srivastava.

Future studies could answer some critical questions about exactly how the infused cells are helping to shrink scars and prompt the growth of new heart muscle. Srivastava notes that it’s unlikely that the new cells are turning into heart muscle themselves, but are more likely helping existing heart muscle generate new tissue. If that’s the case, then researchers can refine the technique to help heart attack patients months or even years after their event to repair their scarred hearts. “The real objective is to offer treatment for people who have a long-standing injury to the heart, and more severe heart disease,” says Marban.

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Healing a Broken Heart: Stem Cell Breakthrough Repairs Scars

Newswise — ANN ARBOR, Mich. – The University of Michigan’s first human embryonic stem cell line will be placed on the U.S. National Institutes of Health’s registry, making the cells available for federally-funded research. It is the first of the stem cell lines derived at the University of Michigan to be placed on the registry.

The line, known as UM4-6, is a genetically normal line, derived in October 2010 from a cluster of about 30 cells removed from a donated five-day-old embryo roughly the size of the period at the end of this sentence. That embryo was created for reproduction but was no longer needed for that purpose and was therefore about to be discarded.

“This is significant, because acceptance of these cells on the registry demonstrates our attention to details of proper oversight, consenting, and following of NIH guidelines established in 2009,” says Gary Smith, Ph.D., who derived the line and also is co-director of the U-M Consortium for Stem Cell Therapies, part of the A. Alfred Taubman Medical Research Institute.

“It now makes the line available to researchers who can apply for federal funding to use it in their work; this is an important step.”

The line is the culmination of years of planning and preparation and was made possible by Michigan voters' November 2008 approval of a state constitutional amendment permitting scientists here to derive embryonic stem cell lines using surplus embryos from fertility clinics or embryos with genetic abnormalities and not suitable for implantation.

“We expect these cells will be used by investigators worldwide to enhance our understanding of stem cell biology, and together with disease-specific lines, discover treatments and cures for genetic diseases,” says Smith, who is a professor in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of Michigan Medical School.

U-M is among just a handful of U.S. universities creating human embryonic stem cell lines. There are only 147 stem cell lines available on the registry.

“We envision in the future that investigators will be able to use the genetically normal embryonic stem cell lines like UM4-6, together with disease-specific embryonic stem cell lines, as a model system to investigate what causes these diseases and come up with treatments,” says Sue O’Shea, professor of Cell and Developmental Biology, and co-director of the Consortium for Stem Cell Therapies.

U-M also has two other human embryonic stem cells lines submitted to the national registry. Both are disease specific, the first carrying the genetic defect that causes hemophilia B, and the other carries the gene responsible for Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease, a hereditary neurological disorder.

Smith expects to soon submit eight additional human embryonic stem lines for consideration on the national registry: three genetically normal and five new disease specific lines.

This is a historic achievement that will lead to treatments and cures for serious, life-altering diseases and is more evidence that our University of Michigan researchers are leading the world in cutting-edge science that will impact health around the globe, says Eva Feldman, M.D., Ph.D., director of the A. Alfred Taubman Medical Research Institute.

"This is another major step forward for medical science in Michigan. This opens us another avenue for researchers to really begin exploring the causes and progression of those diseases, with the ultimate goal of finding new therapies for patients," says Feldman.

Contributors to the A. Alfred Taubman Medical Research Institute's Consortium for Stem Cell Therapies include the Taubman Institute; the Office of the Executive Vice President for Medical Affairs; the Office of the Medical School Dean; the Comprehensive Cancer Center; the Department of Pediatrics and Communicable Diseases; the Office of the Vice President for Research; the School of Dentistry; the Department of Pathology; the Department of Cell and Developmental Biology; the College of Engineering; the Life Sciences Institute; the Department of Neurology; and U-M's Michigan Institute for Clinical and Health Research.

A. Alfred Taubman, founder and chair of U-M’s Taubman Institute, called the registry placement a tremendous step for stem cell research.

“I consider stem cells to be a modern medical miracle – the most exciting advance in medicine since antibiotics. The progress we have made throughout the state in stem cell research has been nothing short of remarkable,” says Taubman.

“This milestone means much to the University of Michigan and the state of Michigan, but also to the world. It offers another route for researchers to move ahead in studying these horrible diseases. We hope it is the first of many lines that the University of Michigan can contribute to the global efforts to improve human health.”

For more information about the A. Alfred Taubman Medical Research Institute at the University of Michigan Medical School, visit http://www.taubmaninstitute.org
For more information about stem cell research at U-M, visit http://www.umich.edu/stemcell

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U-M Human Embryonic Stem Cell Line Placed on National Registry

A Michigan stem cell line developed from a 5-day-old embryo has been approved by the U.S. National Institutes of Health for federally-funded research ? a move that strengthens Michigan?s foothold in the growing field of embryonic stem cell science.

At the University of Michigan, the line known as UM4-6 was cultivated by Gary Smith, co-director of the U-M Consortium for Stem Cell Therapies ? part of the A. Alfred Taubman Medical Research Institute.

In October 2010, Smith took the tiny clump of about 30 cells from a 5-day-old embryo that had been created for reproduction but was no longer needed, according to U-M.

Nurtured in what Smith has called "a very precise culture and the right nutrients,? those cells continued to replicate into millions, even as they remained in their embryonic state.

The line was approved Feb. 2 and now appears on the NIH registry, listed as the 147th stem cell line.

UM4-6 is believed to be disease-free. Though other stem cell lines have been derived elsewhere, only those available on the registry are approved for federally-funded research.

Michigan voters approved a constitutional amendment in November 2008 permitting researchers to use surplus embryonic stem cells in research. That cleared the way for UM4-6?s development.

Two other lines at U-M have been submitted to the national registry. Both are disease specific: one carries a genetic defect that causes hemophilia; the other carries the gene responsible for Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease, a neurological disorder.

Smith is expected to submit eight more lines to the registry ? three that are genetically normal and five that are considered disease-specific.

Contact Robin Erb at 313-222-2708 or rerb@freepress.com

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Federal approval of Michigan embryonic stem cell line gives boost to state research

A University of Michigan stem cell line derived from a 5-day-old embryo has been approved for federally funded research -- a move that strengthens the state's foothold in the embryonic stem cell science world.

It's also a federal stamp of approval that Michigan's informed consent process -- an agreement from parents who donate embryos to such research -- is ethically and legally sound, said Sue O'Shea, codirector of the Consortium for Stem Cell Therapies.

"This opens the door for all kinds of spin-offs and companies," she said. "It has been such a long struggle."

In November 2008, Michigan voters approved a constitutional amendment, Proposal 2, that permitted researchers to use surplus embryos. There were protests from opponents who say the research destroys the embryos.

Gary Smith, the other codirector of the consortium, coaxed UM4-6 into an immortal mass of cells after drawing a tiny clump of about 30 cells from an embryo in 2010. The cells, nurtured in what Smith called "a very precise culture and the right nutrients," continued to replicate into millions, even as they remained in their embryonic state.

On Monday, UM4-6 appeared on the U.S. National Institutes of Health registry as its 147th available line, Smith said.

Other cell lines were contributed by Harvard and Stanford universities, the University of California, Los Angeles, and others.

Ed Rivet, legislative director of Right to Life of Michigan and an opponent of Proposal 2, said UM4-6's inclusion on the national registry wasn't a surprise. But proponents of embryonic stem cell research predicted "pent-up" research demand and an economic boon if the proposal passed, he said.

"One stem cell line after 3 1/2 years isn't a whole lot of product to talk about," he said.

UM4-6 is believed to be disease-free. In contrast, two other lines at U-M that were submitted to the national registry are disease-specific. Eight other lines -- three genetically normal and five with genetic defects -- are in development.

The UM4-6 cells, which will be a control line when comparing diseased cells, will be maintained by U-M, Smith said.

Though the university will charge a minimal fee to recoup costs for maintaining the line, the economic boost comes from "the research (UM4-6) enables and the discoveries that will occur," Smith said.

Contact Robin Erb: 313-222-2708 or rerb@freepress.com

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Feds approve University of Michigan stem cell line

Public release date: 14-Feb-2012
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Contact: Jennifer Beal
healthnews@wiley.com
44-124-377-0633
Wiley-Blackwell

Stem cell therapy moderately improves heart function after a heart attack, according to a systematic review published in The Cochrane Library. But the researchers behind the review say larger clinical trials are needed to establish whether this benefit translates to a longer life.

In a heart attack, the blood supply to parts of the heart is cut off by a blocked artery, causing damage to the heart tissue. The cells in the affected area start to die. This is called necrosis and in the days and weeks that follow, the necrotic area may grow, eventually leaving a large part of the heart unable to contract and increasing the risk of further heart problems. Stem cell therapy uses cells from the patient's own bone marrow to try to repair and reduce this damage. Currently, the treatment is only available in facilities with links to scientific research.

The authors of the review drew together all the available evidence to ask whether adult bone marrow stem cells can effectively prevent and repair the damage caused by a heart attack. In 2008, a Cochrane review of 13 stem cell therapy clinical trials addressed the same question, but the new review adds 20 more recent trials, drawing its conclusions from all 33. By incorporating longer follow up, the later trials provide a better indication of the effects of the therapy several years after treatment.

The total number of patients involved in trials was 1,765. All had already undergone angioplasty, a conventional treatment that uses a balloon to open the blocked artery and reintroduce the blood supply. The review's findings suggest that stem cell therapy using bone marrow-derived stem cells (BMSCs) can produce a moderate long-term improvement in heart function, which is sustained for up to five years. However, there was not enough data to reach firm conclusions about improvements in survival rates.

"This new treatment may lead to moderate improvement in heart function over standard treatments," said lead author of the study, Enca Martin-Rendon, of the Stem Cell Research laboratory, NHS Blood and Transplant at the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford, UK. "Stem cell therapy may also reduce the number of patients who later die or suffer from heart failure, but currently there is a lack of statistically significant evidence based on the small number of patients treated so far."

It is still too early to formulate guidelines for standard practice, according to the review. The authors say further work is required to establish standard methods, including cell dosage, timing of cell transplantation and methods to measure heart function. "The studies were hard to compare because they used so many different methods," said Martin-Rendon. "Larger trials with standardised treatment procedures would help us to know whether this treatment is really effective.

Recently, the task force of the European Society of Cardiology for Stem Cells and Cardiac Repair received funding from the European Union Seventh Framework Programme for Research and Innovation (EU FP7-BAMI) to start such a trial. Principal Investigator for the BAMI trial, and co-author of this Cochrane review, Anthony Mathur, said, ''The BAMI trial will be the largest stem cell therapy trial in patients who have suffered heart attacks and will test whether this treatment prolongs the life of these patients."

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Stem cell treatments improve heart function after heart attack

Public release date: 13-Feb-2012
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Contact: Sally Stewart
sally.stewart@cshs.org
310-248-6566
Cedars-Sinai Medical Center

Results from a Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute clinical trial show that treating heart attack patients with an infusion of their own heart-derived cells helps damaged hearts re-grow healthy muscle.

Patients who underwent the stem cell procedure demonstrated a significant reduction in the size of the scar left on the heart muscle by a heart attack. Patients also experienced a sizable increase in healthy heart muscle following the experimental stem cell treatments.

One year after receiving the stem cell treatment, scar size was reduced from 24 percent to 12 percent of the heart in patients treated with cells (an average drop of about 50 percent). Patients in the control group, who did not receive stem cells, did not experience a reduction in their heart attack scars.

The study appears online at http://www.thelancet.com and will be in a future issue of the journal's print edition.

"While the primary goal of our study was to verify safety, we also looked for evidence that the treatment might dissolve scar and regrow lost heart muscle," said Eduardo Marb?n, MD, PhD, the director of the Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute who invented the procedures and technology involved in the study. "This has never been accomplished before, despite a decade of cell therapy trials for patients with heart attacks. Now we have done it. The effects are substantial, and surprisingly larger in humans than they were in animal tests."

"These results signal an approaching paradigm shift in the care of heart attack patients," said Shlomo Melmed, MD, dean of the Cedars-Sinai medical faculty and the Helene A. and Philip E. Hixon Chair in Investigative Medicine. "In the past, all we could do was to try to minimize heart damage by promptly opening up an occluded artery. Now, this study shows there is a regenerative therapy that may actually reverse the damage caused by a heart attack."

The clinical trial, named CADUCEUS (CArdiosphere-Derived aUtologous stem CElls to Reverse ventricUlar dySfunction), was part of a Phase I investigative study approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and supported by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute.

As an initial part of the study, in 2009, Marb?n and his team completed the world's first procedure in which a patient's own heart tissue was used to grow specialized heart stem cells. The specialized cells were then injected back into the patient's heart in an effort to repair and re-grow healthy muscle in a heart that had been injured by a heart attack.

The 25 patients -- average age of 53 -- who participated in this completed study experienced heart attacks that left them with damaged heart muscle. Each patient underwent extensive imaging scans so doctors could pinpoint the exact location and severity of the scars wrought by the heart attack. Patients were treated at Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute and at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore.

Eight patients served as controls in the study, receiving conventional medical care for heart attack survivors, including prescription medicine, exercise recommendations and dietary advice.

The other 17 patients who were randomized to receive the stem cells underwent a minimally invasive biopsy, under local anesthesia. Using a catheter inserted through a vein in the patient's neck, doctors removed small pieces of heart tissue, about half the size of a raisin. The biopsied heart tissue was then taken to Marb?n's specialized lab at Cedars-Sinai, using methods he invented to culture and multiply the cells.

In the third and final step, the now-multiplied heart-derived cells ? approximately 12 million to 25 million ? were reintroduced into the patient's coronary arteries during a second, minimally invasive [catheter] procedure.

Patients who received stem cell treatment experienced an average of 50 percent reduction in their heart attack scars 12 months after infusion while patients who received standard medical management did not experience shrinkage in the damaged tissue.

"This discovery challenges the conventional wisdom that, once established, scar is permanent and that, once lost, healthy heart muscle cannot be restored," said Marb?n, The Mark S. Siegel Family Professor.

The process to grow cardiac-derived stem cells involved in the study was developed earlier by Marb?n when he was on the faculty of Johns Hopkins University. The university has filed for a patent on that intellectual property and has licensed it to a company in which Dr. Marb?n has a financial interest. No funds from that company were used to support the clinical study. All funding was derived from the National Institutes of Health and Cedars-Sinai Medical Center.

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About the Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute

The Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute is internationally recognized for outstanding heart care built on decades of innovation and leading-edge research. From cardiac imaging and advanced diagnostics to surgical repair of complex heart problems to the training of the heart specialists of tomorrow and research that is deepening medical knowledge and practice, the Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute is known around the world for excellence and innovations.

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First-of-its-kind stem cell study re-grows healthy heart muscle in heart attack patients

MONDAY, Feb. 13 (HealthDay News) -- Stem cell therapy's promise for healing damaged tissues may have gotten a bit closer to reality. In a small, early study, heart damage was reversed in heart-attack patients treated with their own cardiac stem cells, researchers report.

The cells, called cardiosphere-derived stem cells, regrew damaged heart muscle and reversed scarring one year later, the authors say.

Up until now, heart specialists' best tool to help minimize damage following a heart attack has been to surgically clear blocked arteries.

"In our treatment, we dissolved scar and replaced it with living heart muscle. Such 'therapeutic regeneration' has long been the holy grail of cell therapy, but had never been accomplished before; we now seem to have done it," said study author Dr. Eduardo Marban, director of the Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute in Los Angeles.

However, outside experts cautioned that the findings are preliminary and the treatment is far from ready for widespread use among heart-attack survivors.

The study, published online Feb. 14 in The Lancet, involved 25 middle-aged patients (average age 53) who had suffered a heart attack. Seventeen underwent stem cell infusions while eight received standard post-heart attack care, including medication and exercise therapy.

The stem cells were obtained using a minimally invasive procedure, according to the researchers from Cedars-Sinai and the Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore.

Patients received a local anesthetic and then a catheter was threaded through a neck vein down to the heart, where a tiny portion of muscle was taken. The sample provided all the researchers needed to generate a supply of new stem cells -- 12 million to 25 million -- that were then transplanted back into the heart-attack patient during a second minimally invasive procedure.

One year after the procedure, the infusion patients' cardiac scar sizes had shrunk by about half. Scar size was reduced from 24 percent to 12 percent of the heart, the team said. In contrast, the patients receiving standard care experienced no scar shrinkage.

Initial muscle damage and healed tissue were measured using MRI scans.

After six months, four patients in the stem-cell group experienced serious adverse events compared with only one patient in the control group. At one year, two more stem-cell patients had a serious complication. However, only one such event -- a heart attack -- might have been related to the treatment, according to the study.

In a news release, Marban said that "the effects are substantial and surprisingly larger in humans than they were in animal tests."

Other experts were cautiously optimistic. Cardiac expert Dr. Bernard Gersh, a professor of medicine at Mayo Clinic, is not affiliated with the research but is familiar with the findings.

"This study demonstrates that it is safe and feasible to administer these cardiac-derived stem cells and the results are interesting and encouraging," he said.

Another specialist said that while provocative and promising, the findings remain early, phase-one research. "It's a proof-of-concept study," said interventional cardiologist Dr. Thomas Povsic, an assistant professor of medicine at the Duke Clinical Research Institute, in Durham, N.C.

And Dr. Chip Lavie, medical director of Cardiac Rehabilitation and Prevention at the John Ochsner Heart and Vascular Institute, in New Orleans, also discussed the results. He said that while the study showed that the cardiac stem cells reduced scar tissue and increased the area of live heart tissue in heart attack patients with moderately damaged overall heart tissue, it did not demonstrate a reduction in heart size or any improvement in the heart's pumping ability.

"It did not improve the ejection fraction, which is a very important measurement used to define the overall heart's pumping ability," Lavie noted. "Certainly, much larger studies of various types of heart attack patients will be needed before this even comes close to being a viable potential therapy for the large number of heart attack initial survivors."

Povsic concurred that much larger studies are needed. "The next step is showing it really helps patients in some kind of meaningful way, by either preventing death, healing them or making them feel better."

It's unclear what the cost will be, Povsic added. "What society is going to be willing to pay for this is going to be based on how much good it ends up doing. If they truly regenerate a heart and prevent a heart transplant, that would save a lot money."

Marban, who invented the stem cell treatment, said the while it would not replace bypass surgery or angioplasty, "it might be useful in treating 'irreversible' injury that may persist after those procedures."

As a rough estimate, he said that if larger, phase 2 trials were successful, the treatment might be available to the general public by about 2016.

More information

The U.S. National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute describes current heart attack treatment.

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Stem Cell Treatment Might Reverse Heart Attack Damage

PIEDMONT, Okla. -- Stem cell research is one of the newest and most exciting areas of study. Experts believe these tiny unwritten cells hold the keys to curing a number of diseases and debilitating injuries. But here in the U.S., stem cell research isn't moving fast enough for a growing number of families.

This is the story of an Oklahoma family that traveled to China for cutting-edge stem cell treatment not offered in the US.

Cora Beth Taylor walks a different road than most will ever travel.

Her journey is filled with obstacles, heartbreak and triumph.

Cora, William and Tate Taylor are triplets born premature.

The brothers have never shown any signs of prematurity.

But Cora, at about a year old, started falling behind developmentally.

By 18 months she had been diagnosed with Cerebral Palsy.

Cora has never had any cognitive delays.

She's a super-smart little gal but her muscles haven't developed properly.

It's devastating; they just won't cooperate.

Cora's parents, Kevin and Beth Taylor, have tried everything for their little girl; that is, everything available in the U.S.

Last year, Piedmont Schools raised the money to help the Taylors take Cora to China for treatment, close to $50,000.

Research hospitals in China are using stem cells from donor umbilical cord blood to treat children with Cerebral Palsy.

Beth Taylor says, "That was a difficult decision to make to take your child to a foreign country for medical treatments. Living in the US you feel like this is the best there is."

The Taylors spent 37 days in China.

Cora Beth had eight stem cell transfusions.

Through a spinal tap, doctors put the cells into her spinal column where they penetrate the blood-brain barrier and get to work.

Critics are quick to point out this area of regenerative medicine has largely unverified effectiveness. Results are often anecdotal and the FDA is a long way from approving this type of experimental treatment for America.

Though the Taylors are convinced and here's why.

Beth Taylor said, "Within the first couple of weeks we could see changes. We could see definite improvements in strength and balance."

Cora had never been able to do a sit-up in her life ever; she did her first in China.

Nine-year-old Cora remembers, "The thing that I was most happy about accomplishing was a sit up. Because I'd tried to do a sit up before going to China but I just couldn't do it."

Now, Cora Beth can do 20.

The most notable change has been Cora's walk.

This third-grader had never gone to school without her walker.

Today she walks the halls without it; she hasn't used it in months.

She recently competed in a beauty pageant in her hometown of Piedmont, without the help of her walker as well.

Cora says, "So, I'm really excited. I don't think there's anything that I couldn't accomplish."

Doctors say Cora’s stem cells will continue to mature over the next few years.

For her, there are many milestones ahead.

In the US, Duke University is studying stem cell treatments for children with Cerebral Palsy.

Right now they don't have FDA clearance to use donor stem-cells.

Experts say treatment similar to Cora Beth's Chinese therapy is years away in the U.S.

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Stem cell treatments change girl's life

SAN DIEGO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--

Animal Cell Therapies (ACT), a company specializing in veterinary diagnostics and cell-based therapies, today announced that its stem cell inventory is valued at more than $6 million. The evaluation, conducted by Cheetahlink and Capital Consulting Services, demonstrates the importance of this first step in the company’s mission to improve and extend the lives of dogs through innovative stem cell products and services.

When Animal Cell Therapies was created, the company partnered with a select group of researchers, scientists and collaborators from the U.S. and abroad to create an in-house program to grow and expand well-characterized animal stem cells in a scientific setting. The company’s founder, Dr. Kathryn Petrucci, recognized that in order to provide pure, potent, reliable, pathogen-free animal stem cells, ACT must optimize stem cell storage while improving stem cell transportation procedures and delivery techniques.

“This valuation essentially validates that the foundation we’ve set for this company – in the creation and maintaining of this stem cell inventory – is sound and will support the next steps in our strategy,” said Adam Irving, chief executive officer of Animal Cell Therapies. “Our capabilities are far reaching with broad applications.”

In maintaining its stem cell inventory, Animal Cell Therapies conducts specific cell assays, characterization processes and procedures to assess potential toxicity and consistently assure safety, purity, potency and a stable finished stem cell product or stem cell derivative. In addition, Animal Cell Therapies monitors processes with standardized, rigorous quality control specifications and testing parameters.

About Animal Cell Therapies
Founded in January 2008 in San Diego, California, Animal Cell Therapies (ACT) is the manifestation of veterinarian, Dr. Kathryn Petrucci, whose vision is to improve the lives of animals through thoughtful research and development, innovation and strategic partnerships. At the Company’s California-based stem cell research and development facility, the ACT team is focused on developing and delivering revolutionary cellular treatment and services to their customers. For more information, visit http://www.actcells.com.

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Animal Cell Therapies Announces Cell Inventory Value at $6 Million

University of Queensland scientists have developed a world-first method for producing adult stem cells that will substantially impact patients who have a range of serious diseases.

The research is a collaborative effort involving UQ's Australian Institute for Bioengineering and Nanotechnology (AIBN) and is led by UQ Clinical Research Centre's (UQCCR) Professor Nicholas Fisk.

It revealed a new method to create mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs), which can be used to repair bone and potentially other organs.

?We used a small molecule to induce embryonic stem cells over a 10 day period, which is much faster than other studies reported in the literature,? Professor Fisk said.

?The technique also worked on their less contentious counterparts, induced pluripotent stem cells.

?To make the pluripotent mature stem cells useful in the clinic, they have to be told what type of cell they need to become (pre-differentiated), before being administered to an injured organ, or otherwise they could form tumours.

?Because only small numbers of MSCs exist in the bone marrow and harvesting bone marrow from a healthy donor is an invasive procedure, the ability to make our own MSCs in large number in the laboratory is an exciting step in the future widespread clinical use of MSCs.

?We were able to show these new forms of stem cells exhibited all the characteristics of bone marrow stem cells and we are currently examining their bone repair capability."

AIBN Associate Professor and Co-Investigator on the project, Ernst Wolvetang said the new protocol had overcome a significant barrier in the translation of stem cell-based therapy.

?We are very excited by this research, which has brought together stem cell researchers from two of the major UQ research hubs UQCCR and AIBN,? Associate Professor Wolvetang said.

The research is published in the February edition of the STEM CELLS Translational Medicine journal.

UniQuest, The University of Queensland's main commercialisation company, invites parties interested in licensing the intellectual property relating to this discovery to contact UniQuest on 3365 4037 or lifesciences@uniquest.com.au.

Media Contact: Kirsten Rogan, Communications and Media, University of Queensland Faculty of Health Sciences, 07 3346 5308, 0412307594 or k.rogan@uq.edu.au

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UQ researchers make breakthrough in stem cell research