Category Archives: Maine Stem Cells

A 16-year-old girl from Kerala has got a new lease of life, thanks to a benevolent gesture from a 55-year-old German man. The teenage girl was suffering from an advanced stage of leukaemia or bone marrow cancer and underwent a transfusion of healthy stem cells donated by the German national.

She surely is lucky: Even though doctors treating her could not find matching stem cells among more than 70,000 donors registered in India, they finally could locate with the help of an international agency the only one donor whose stem cells matched perfectly with those of the girl patient.

"This is perhaps one of the rarest transnational stem cell donation cases in the country. As there was no matching stem cells from among more than 70,000 listed in a registry in India, we sought help from German-based international registry DKMS," Neeraj Sidharthan, head of stem cell transplant unit at Amrita Institute of Medical Sciences and Research Centre here, told IANS.

"We have been told that this person was the only one whose stem cells matched with the girl's," he said.

After receiving the healthy stem cells from the 55-year-old German man, the girl has since been completely cured of the life-threatening ailment.

"She comes to me for routine check-up and she is doing perfectly fine," said Sidharthan.

Recalling the case, Sidharthan said the girl had a relapsed acute myeloid leukaemia and her chances of survival were slim.

"We suggested allogenic stem cell transplantation, or transfer of stem cells from a healthy person, to save the patient. It's easy since the donar stem cells come either from a sibling or parents. However, in this girl's case, it did not happen," said the doctor.

The doctor finally contacted Germany-based international registry DKMS, and as luck would have it, just one perfectly matching donar stem cells were found.

Once the donor was finalised, the girl was admitted to the institute for pre-transplant tests and administeration of chemotherapeutic drugs to prevent side effects, since the stem cells were to come from an international donor of the opposite sex.

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Healthy stem cells donated by German man give Kerala girl ...

Stem cell therapy goes to the dogs

A surgical team at Veterinary Specialty Center in Buffalo Grove removes fat from Doodle, a 9-year-old German Shepherd suffering from osteoarthritis and hip dysplasia. Stem cells will be derived from the fat and injected into the dog. Photo submitted by Veterinary Specialty Center

Doodle was the first dog to receive the new one-day stem cell procedure in Illinois./Photo submitted by Veterinary Specialty Center

Things were getting bad for Doodle. Despite her youthful name, the 9-year-old German Shepherd was experiencing joint pain from bilateral hip dysplasia and osteoarthritis. She would get sore and tired from long weekend walks and started falling up the stairs.

Her owners, the Dahl family of Oak Brook, had tried different options before landing on animal stem cell regenerative therapy, a procedure thats a hot topic in the veterinary world. Last week, Doodle received reportedly the first such one-day operation in Illinois at the Veterinary Specialty Center in Buffalo Grove.

The practice of using stem cells, derived from the animals fat, to treat joint problems could be discouraging for pet owners because of cost and timing. The animal used to have to go twice to a vet hospital: once for surgery to remove fat cells and once again for the injection of the stem cells into the inflamed joint. The cost was around $2,700.

Leslie Dahl, Doodles owner and a veterinarian herself, didnt want to go that route. She had tried anti-inflammatory medication, but Doodles stomach couldnt handle it. She tried collagen injections, but they didnt fully relieve Doodle of her pain. Plus, the animal already was difficult at the vets and she was concerned that Doodle would get too anxious between the visits.

So when the Veterinary Specialty Center started looking into a new procedure that allows the stem cells to be processed in the same facility on the same day for about $1,900, Dahl was intrigued.

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VICTORIES & SUCCESS STORIES | The Stem Cell Blog | Page 8

Indian J Orthop. 2012 Jan-Feb; 46(1): 1018.

Department of University Health Network, Toronto Western Hospital, Toronto, Canada, ON M5T 2S8

This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Spinal cord injury (SCI) is a devastating condition associated with significant functional and sensory deficits, emotional, social, and financial burdens, and an increased risk of cardiovascular complications, deep vein thrombosis, osteoporosis, pressure ulcers, autonomic dysreflexia, and neuropathic pain.

The estimated annual global incidence of SCI is 1540 cases per million. In the USA, approximately 1.275 million individuals are affected, with over 12,000 new cases each year.15 The most common causes of traumatic SCI are road traffic accidents, falls, occupational and sports-related injuries that result in contusion and compression of the spinal cord.1 Approximately 55% of SCIs occur at the cervical level (C1 to C7-T1) with a mortality of 10% in the first year following injury and an expected lifespan of only 1015 years post-injury, and thoracic (T1T11), thoracolumbar (T11T12 to L1L2) and lumbosacral (L2S5) injuries each account for approximately 15% of SCI.14 Depending on the age of the patient, severity, and levels of SCI, the lifetime cost of health care and other injury-related expenses can reach $25 million.15

Despite advances in pre-hospital care, medical and surgical management and rehabilitation approaches, many SCI sufferers still experience substantial neurological disability. Intensive efforts are underway to develop effective neuroprotective and regenerative strategies.

SCI involves a primary (the physical injury) and a secondary injury (the subsequent cascade of molecular and cellular events which amplify the original injury).6 The primary injury damages both upper and lower motor neurons and disrupts motor, sensory and autonomic functions. Pathophysiological processes occurring in the secondary injury phase are rapidly instigated in response to the primary injury in an attempt to homeostatically control and minimize the damage. Paradoxically, this response is largely responsible for exacerbating the initial damage and creating an inhibitory milieu that prevents endogenous efforts of repair, regeneration and remyelination. These secondary processes include inflammation, ischemia, lipid peroxidation, production of free radicals, disruption of ion channels, axonal demyelination, glial scarring (astrogliosis), necrosis and programmed cell death. Nevertheless, endogenous repair and regenerative mechanisms during the secondary phase of injury minimize the extent of the lesion (through astrogliosis), reorganize blood supply through angiogenesis, clear cellular debris, and reunite and remodel damaged neural circuits. The spatial and temporal dynamics of these secondary mediators7 are fundamental to SCI pathophysiology and as such offer exploitable targets for therapeutic intervention.

A multitude of characteristics of cells tested pre-clinically and clinically make them attractive to potentially address the multifactorial nature of the pathophysiology of secondary SCI they are anti-inflammatory, immunomodulatory,812 anti-gliotic,13 pro-oligodendrogliogenic,14 pro-neuronogenic,15 and secrete various anti-apoptotic and pro-angiogenic neurotrophic factors. Given the pathophysiological targets of SCI,7 transplanted cells should: 1) enable regenerating axons to cross barriers; 2) functionally replace lost cells; and/or 3) create an environment supportive of neural repair.16 However, given the multifactorial nature of SCI and its dynamic pathophysiological consequences, the success of future clinical trials of cell therapy will likely depend on the informed co-administration of multiple strategies, including pharmacological and rehabilitation therapies.7

Different sources and types of cells have been and/or are being tested in clinical trials for SCI, including embryonic stem cells (ESCs), neural progenitor cells (NPCs), bone marrow mesenchymal cells (BMSCs) and non-stem cells such as olfactory ensheathing cells and Schwann cells.17 Other cell types are being developed for the clinic, including other sources of mesenchymal cells (fetal blood,18 adipose tissue, umbilical cord1936), adult21,37 and immortalized neural progenitors (PISCES, NCT01151124), skin-derived progenitors,3847 induced pluripotent stem cells4852 and endogenous spinal cord progenitors5358 []. The advantages and disadvantages of each cell source and type being considered or already in clinical trials for SCI have been extensively described and compared elsewhere,17,5963 and reflect their potential in the clinic []. There are currently more than a dozen cell therapy clinical trials for SCI listed on clinicaltrials.gov.64 Most are Phase I or I/II clinical safety and feasibility studies, indicating that cellular treatments for SCI developed in the laboratory are still in the very early stages of clinical translation.

A comparison of the different cell types and sources currently in (*) or under consideration for clinical trials for SCI

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Current stem cell treatments for spinal cord injury

MARLBORO Advanced Cell Technology Inc. has changed its name to Ocata Therapeutics Inc., a move the biotechnology company said reflects its focus on treatments for eye diseases.

The company's ticker symbol also changed to OCAT.

Ocata is at least the third name for the company, which is developing medical treatments based on embryonic stem cell technology.

The business was a subsidiary of Maine poultry company Avian Farms during the 1990s, then merged with a business incorporated in Nevada to sell dolls. The merger gave the company, renamed Advanced Cell Technology, a publicly traded stock.

Ocata has no products on the market and has piled up millions of dollars in losses since its formation. Under the President and Chief Executive Paul K. Wotton, the company has been shoring up financing to support its research, settling lawsuits over securities it sold and taking millions of shares off the market through a reverse split.

Ocata is also seeking to list its shares on a major exchange. The company reported in a presentation posted last week on its website that it was in talks with the Nasdaq stock exchange.

Ocata stock closed Monday at $6.79 a share, down 23 cents on the Over-the-Counter Bulletin Board, an exchange for small companies that do not meet the listing requirements of larger exchanges.

Mr. Wotton said in a news release that the name change comes as the company is positioning itself in the field of regenerative ophthalmology.

"With that, we determined it was important to select a company name that best reflects our focus going forward," he said.

Ocata's lead product is retinal cells derived from human embryonic stem cells. The retinal cells are being tested in humans as a possible treatment for two vision-robbing eye diseases, Stargardt's macular dystrophy and age-related macular degeneration.

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Advanced Cell Technology changes its name to Ocata

Lund center for Stem Cell Biology and Cell Therapy is one of six Swedish strategic centers of excellence in life sciences, supported by the Swedish Foundation for Strategic Research. Established in January 2003, the center focuses on stem cell and developmental biology of the central nervous and blood systems, and development of stem cell and cell replacement therapies in these organ systems as well as research in non-mammalian model systems.

A post-doctoral research position is available in the Glioma Cell Therapy Group lead by Johan Bengzon. The aim of our program is to develop a clinical therapy of invasive brain tumors using tumor-tropic cellular vectors for the delivery of immunostimulatory and tumoricidal substances. Using models of glioblastoma, the most common and aggressive form of primary brain tumour, we currently explore the potential of migratory cellular vector systems that effectively home to tumour microsatellites and eliminate these by delivering antitumor agents. The project is also designed to identify novel target for the development of improved pharmacological treatment of GBM.

Lund Stem Cell Center presents: International Young Investigator Symposium 2014 - Technologies in Stem Cell Research! The Lund Stem Cell Center is pleased to announce the first annual International Young Investigator Symposium consisting of three first authors of key publications in the past year. While senior authors often get the chance to promote high impact work we feel that the scientists behind the actual experiments deserve more exposure. Our theme for 2014 isTechnologies in Stem Cell Researchand our vision is to stimulate scientific exchange and facilitate future collaborations.

Congratulations to our new Ragnar Sderberg Fellows 2014Cristian Bellodi and Gran Karlsson! Cristian and Gran received 8 million SEK funding each for their work on post-transcriptional regulatory mechanisms that modulate stem cell function and the molecular mechanisms discriminating normal and malignant stem cells, respectively.

A previously unknown mechanism through which the brain produces new nerve cells after a stroke has been discovered at Stem Cell Center and Karolinska Institutet. The findings have been published in the journal SCIENCE.

Ulrich Pfisterer presented his dissertation Direct Conversion of Human Fibroblasts to Induced Neuronsin biomedicine focusing Neurobiology. Main supervisor: Associate Professor Malin Parmar. Opponent: PhD Marius Wernig, Stanford. Chairman of the defense: Professor Cecilia Lundberg

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Lund Stem Cell Center | Medicinska fakulteten, Lunds ...

WE MUST OPPOSE THE KILLING OF BABIES - INCLUDING THE SMALLEST ONES

The Truth about Stem Cell Research

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There is a controversy in America today over "stem cell research." The purpose of this report is to provide you with the real facts about the matter.

It is being said that if federal funds were allocated to embryonic stem cell research, most wonderful medical cures would result,cures which could not be obtained by any other means.

Here is a brief summary of the situation:

The spending of private funds on embryonic stem cell research is not prohibited in America. Private and corporate money can be spent on the research, if this was desired. The quarrel is over the fact that the federal government will not provide the research funds.

To date, in spite of extensive private research, embryonic stem cells have not been found capable of healing anything! That is why little private research money is currently being allocated to embryonic stem cell research. It never produces any useable results.

The problem is that embryonic stem cells tend to go wild and do not multiply into the kind of cells that researchers want them to.

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Stem-Cell - Pathlights

Science is slowly catching up with science fiction. Doctors can transplant the heart, lung, liver, kidneys and more recently hand transplants. Parts of the eye such as corneal transplants are also available.

The holy grail would be an eye transplant or the ability to regrow an eye with the help of stem cells. While there is no real prospect of achieving this in the near future there is continuing research working towards this end.

The three main impediments to transplanting a human eye are maintenance of donor eye viability, optic-nerve regeneration and restoration of topographic organisation, and avoidance of immunological rejection.

Reattaching the millions of nerves of the optic nerve to allow transfer of the information from the eye to the brain is the greatest impediment to achieving a viable eye transplant. If we are able to achieve this we still have the complications of restoring the circulation to the eye, balancing pressure of the transplanted eye and maintaining corneal health.

The earliest record of an eye transplant dates back to 1885 when a rabbit eye was transplanted into a human orbit. Since then there has been numerous attempts to transplant a mammalian eye. Although some of the studies establish success in other capacities, no visual function was recovered following transplantation.

There has been some success with eye transplantation performed in cold-blooded vertebrate.

A frog with the transplanted artificial eye on the left.

Professor Makoto Asashima of Tokyo University in Japan has used stem cell-like cells from a frog embryo to grow complete eyes which were then successfully transplanted into tadpoles.

Professor Asashima believes that his groundbreaking research could pave the way for the same procedure to be used to restore vision in humans.

So far, Professor Asashima and his team have transplanted new eyes into about 60 tadpoles, of which nearly three-quarters could then see. And 7 of the transplanted eyes have survived the metamorphosis from tadpole to frog.

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Eye transplants and stem cells. - Artificial Eyes ...

The state of maine in the United States has no specific laws regarding stem cell research, though the state has a long history in progressive biomedi-cal research dating back to the founding of Jackson Laboratory on Mt. Desert Island in 1929. The state has made a commitment to monetary investment in research and development for their modest biomedicine industry to support innovation while creating jobs and improving the economy.

In March 2007 a bill (LD 1402 An Act to Authorize a General Fund Bond Issue to Enhance Funding for Stem Cell Research in Maine) was introduced into the Maine legislature. The bill would have directed bond revenue to fund stem cell research and establish an umbilical cord bank in the state. Along with the bill, the sponsor offered an amendment to limit the funding to adult stem cells to avoid the embryonic stem cell controversy. However, the bill did not progress and appears to be dead due to legislative rules.

With no federal funding available for stem cell research, Maine researchers must rely on grant money and state support. In 2006 the governor made funding of stem cell research a priority and set a goal of achieving $1 billion annual expenditure on biomedical research in Maine by the year 2010. Investment by the State of Maine on building infrastructure (labs and equipment) is expected to result in a return on investment through grant funding from outside sources, including a recent National Institutes of Health grant and opportunities for increased biotech business development in commercially viable products and therapies.

Jackson Laboratory in Bar Harbor was started in 1929 by Clarence Cook Little as a cancer research facility. The mission of Jackson Laboratory is to perform primary genetic research and provide resources and education to support other researchers in treating human disease. To meet this goal, the laboratory breeds mice, inducing over 800 varieties of targeted genetic traits and diseases. These mice as well as frozen embryos and DNA samples are available for shipment to investigators worldwide.

In addition to the breeding program, researchers at Jackson Laboratory are studying cancers, immunology, neurobiology, metabolic diseases, developmental and reproductive biology and computational biology (genes). In 1956 a research team at Jackson Lab transplanted blood forming cells from the living into anemic mice. The majority of the anemic mice were cured within 60 days, providing the first evidence of stem cell transplant ability to cure disease.

Current stem cell research in animal models includes the use of adult stem cells as possible treatment for genetic disorders like lysosomal storage disease, minimizing the effect of graft-versus-host disease after stem cell transplant and the direct implantation of neuronal stem cells into the brain to solve the problem of minimal stem cell entry into the central nervous system.

The Maine Medical Center Research Institute (MMCRI) in Scarborough opened in 1996. With both laboratory and clinical research spaces, the institute maintains academic ties with the University of Maine at Orono, University of Vermont Medical School, Dartmouth Medical School, the Jackson Laboratory, and the University of New England College of Osteopathic Medicine. The center grew from the previous success in research with funding from the National Institutes of Health dating back to the 1950s. At MMCRI, a research team identified signaling pathways and the genes controlling stem cell renewal and differentiation as well as discovering the possibility of using adult stem cells in developing a wide range of tissue cells. The institute focuses on research, education, and patient care.

The University of Maine at Orono opened in 1868 and over time developed a reputation as a nationally recognized research school. In collaboration with the Maine Medical Center Research Institute and the Jackson Laboratory, the university now offers a Ph.D. program in functional genom-ics, which includes laboratory rotations at each partners institution and encourages having more than one mentor to enhance understanding of the biological mechanisms as well as the technology. Current stem cell research at the university is focused on the analysis of cell surface proteins for signaling and response as well as the dynamic processes involved.

The Mount Desert Island Biological Laboratory located in Salisbury Cove was founded in 1898 as the Tufts Summer School of Biology. The mission of the laboratory is the study of marine life for advancing knowledge of developmental and life mechanisms with correlations to human health, especially in the areas of cardiovascular, pulmonary, and renal disease. The laboratory has the special distinction of being one of only four NIEHS Marine and Freshwater Biomedical Science Centers.

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Maine (Stem Cell) - what-when-how

PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:

20-Aug-2014

Contact: Jim Fessenden james.fessenden@umassmed.edu 508-856-2000 University of Massachusetts Medical School

WORCESTER, MA Using population-based screening outcomes of approximately 3 million infants, a team of scientists across 14 states, including four researchers at the University of Massachusetts Medical School, have shown that newborn screening for severe combined immunodeficiency (SCID) can be successfully implemented across public health newborn screening programs. Data from 11 newborn screening programs published in the Aug. 20 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) showed the rate of SCID in newborns is higher than previously thought and believed to be 1 in 58,000.

Newborn screening programs enable early detection of conditions for which prompt treatments can reduce the risk of death or irreversible damage. The first heritable immune disorders to which newborn screening has been applied are those that together comprise severe combined immunodeficiency. SCID babies are born without a developed immune system and are subject to a wide variety of life-threatening infections. However, the advance of stem cell transplantation to replace the immune system, coupled now with the opportunity to identify SCID early through newborn screening, holds the promise that affected children can lead normal, healthy lives. Early detection is critical for treatment of SCID and, in most cases, population-based testing through newborn screening programs is the only means to detect SCID prior to the onset of infections.

Unlike other conditions included in newborn screening, SCID requires a DNA-based testing strategy for every infant screened. In 2008, Wisconsin and Massachusetts were awarded grants from the Centers for Disease Control to develop, demonstrate and transfer testing strategies that could be adopted by other newborn screening programs. With data generated by these pilot programs, SCID was added to the national recommended uniform panel for newborn screened disorders in 2010. Currently 23 states, the District of Columbia and the Navajo Nation screen approximately two-thirds of all infants born in the United States for SCID.

The New England Newborn Screening Program, which is operated by the University of Massachusetts Medical School, has been performing newborn screening in Massachusetts since 1962 and now provides screening for about 500 newborns every day in Massachusetts, Maine, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and Vermont; SCID screening has been offered statewide in Massachusetts since early 2009 and Maine and Rhode Island recently authorized the New England Newborn Screening Program to test infants for SCID.

Antonia Kwan, PhD, MRCPCH, of the University of California, San Francisco, and collaborators, including members from the Massachusetts SCID Newborn Screening Working Group, conducted the analysis of more than 3 million infants screened for SCID in 10 states and the Navajo Nation. Infants born from the start of each participating program from January 2008 through the most recent evaluable date prior to July 2013 were included.

There were 52 SCID cases identified within the cohort, for an overall incidence of 1 in 58,000 births, up from the previous estimate of 1 in 100,000 births.

The incidence was not significantly different in any state program but was higher in the Navajo Nation (1/3,500), attributed to a genetic mutation found in this population. Survival of SCID-affected infants through their diagnosis and immune reconstitution was 87 percent, and 92 percent for infants who received transplantation, enzyme replacement and/or gene therapy. Additional interventions for SCID and non-SCID T-cell lymphopenia (abnormally low level of certain white blood cells) included immunoglobulin infusions, preventive antibiotics and avoidance of live vaccines. The observed short term outcomes confirm the benefit of newborn screening as was recently predicted by the retrospective study of transplantation outcomes from Pai et al (NEJM 371:5 July 31, 2014).

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Newborn screening expansion offers early diagnosis and treatment to infants with SCID