Category Archives: Regenerative Medicine

At Mayo Clinic, an integrated team, including stem cell biologists, bioengineers, doctors and scientists, work together and study regenerative medicine. The goal of the team is to treat diseases using novel therapies, such as stem cell therapy and bioengineering. Doctors in transplant medicine and transplant surgery have pioneered the study of regenerative medicine during the past five decades, and doctors continue to study new innovations in transplant medicine and surgery.

In stem cell therapy, or regenerative medicine, researchers study how stem cells may be used to replace, repair, reprogram or renew your diseased cells. Stem cells are able to grow and develop into many different types of cells in your body. Stem cell therapy may use adult cells that have been genetically reprogrammed in the laboratory (induced pluripotent stem cells), your own adult stem cells that have been reprogrammed or cells developed from an embryo (embryonic stem cells).

Researchers also study and test how reprogrammed stem cells may be turned into specialized cells that can repair or regenerate cells in your heart, blood, nerves and other parts of your body. These stem cells have the potential to treat many conditions. Stem cells also may be studied to understand how other conditions occur, to develop and test new medications, and for other research.

Researchers across Mayo Clinic, with coordination through the Center for Regenerative Medicine, are discovering, translating and applying stem cell therapy as a potential treatment for cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, degenerative joint conditions, brain and nervous system (neurological) conditions, such as Parkinson's disease, and many other conditions. For example, researchers are studying the possibility of using stem cell therapy to repair or regenerate injured heart tissue to treat many types of cardiovascular diseases, from adult acquired disorders to congenital diseases. Read about regenerative medicine research for hypoplastic left heart syndrome.

Cardiovascular diseases, neurological conditions and diabetes have been extensively studied in stem cell therapy research. They've been studied because the stem cells affected in these conditions have been the same cell types that have been generated in the laboratory from various types of stem cells. Thus, translating stem cell therapy to a potential treatment for people with these conditions may be a realistic goal for the future of transplant medicine and surgery.

Researchers conduct ongoing studies in stem cell therapy. However, research and development of stem cell therapy is unpredictable and depends on many factors, including regulatory guidelines, funding sources and recent successes in stem cell therapy. Mayo Clinic researchers aim to expand research and development of stem cell therapy in the future, while keeping the safety of patients as their primary concern.

Mayo Clinic offers stem cell transplant (bone marrow transplant) for people who've had leukemia, lymphoma or other conditions that have been treated with chemotherapy.

Mayo Clinic currently offers a specialty consult service for regenerative medicine within the Transplant Center, the first consult service established in the United States to provide guidance for patients and families regarding stem cell-based protocols. This consult service provides medical evaluations for people with many conditions who have questions about the potential use of stem cell therapy. The staff provides guidance to determine whether stem cell clinical trials are appropriate for these individuals. Regenerative medicine staff may be consulted if a doctor or patient has asked about the potential use of stem cell therapies for many conditions, including degenerative or congenital diseases of the heart, liver, pancreas or lungs.

People sometimes have misconceptions about the use and applications of stem cell therapies. This consult service provides people with educational guidance and appropriate referrals to research studies and clinical trials in stem cell therapies for the heart, liver, pancreas and other organs. Also, the consult service supports ongoing regenerative medicine research activities within Mayo Clinic, from basic science to clinical protocols.

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Regenerative Medicine - Transplant Center - Mayo Clinic

I began treating with Dr. Horn for pain in my lower back and hips. The diagnosis took a bit of time for us to figure out but when he was able to pinpoint the injury, his recommended course of treatment was conservatively aggressive to help get me back to a point where I could sit without much discomfort. At first we tried conventional modalities for treatment including Physical Therapy and injections. As these treatments began to have minimal improvements, Dr. Horn recommended PRP. He walked me through how the PRP works and suggested I do some research to see if I was willing to try this modality of treatment. As we discussed the treatment, Dr. Horn was very clear on the fact that this may take multiple treatments. I asked, "What is multiple?" He said, "At least twomaybe three or four." After the first treatment, I thought, "Why would I put myself through that again?" Then I began to see the improvements as time went on and I continued with therapy. Then came a second plateau and we tried many other alternatives. I agreed to a second round of PRP and the improvement I had was remarkable! It has been well over a year and I continue to see improvements in my hips, which I believe are fundamentally due to the PRP and Physical Therapy combination. The physical therapy was only going to get my so far and the PRP has pushed my healing well over to the top.

Thank you, Dr. Horn for taking the time to explain the PRP treatment, advantages and disadvantages, and most importantly for thinking outside the traditional treatment modalities to help push my healing process.

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Biologic Healing Regenerative Medicine

AGENDA PROCEEDINGS

Congratulations to trainees who won prizes!From left: Marissa Scavuzzo (RU), Gautham Yepuri (HMRI), Samantha Paulsen (RU), Danielle Wu (RU), and John Leach (BCM). Not pictured: Alexander Tatara (RU)

Stem Cell Category: Trainee Speakership and Award: John Leach, Baylor College of Medicine Hippo signaling deletion in heart failure reverses functional declineLeach J, Heallen T, Zhang M, Rahmani M, Martin J

1st Place Poster Award: Marissa Scavuzzo,Baylor College of Medicine Isl1 Directs Cell Fate Decisions in the Pancreas by Specifying Progenitor Cells Towards Different Endocrine LineagesScavuzzo MA, Yang D, Sharp R, Wamble K, Chmielowiec J, Mumcuyan N, Borowiak M

2nd Place Poster Award: Gautham Yepuri, Houston Methodist Research Institute Proton Pump Inhibitors Impair Vascular Function By Accelerating Endothelial SenescenceYepuri G, Sukhovershin R, Nazari-shafti TZ, Ghebremariam YT, Cooke JP

Tissue Engineering Category: Trainee Speakership and Award: Samantha Paulsen, Rice University 3D printing vascularized tissues: Closing the loop between computational and experimental models Paulsen SJ, Miller JS

1st Place Poster Award: Alexander Tatara, Rice University Using the Body to Regrow the Body: In vivo Bioreactors for Craniofacial Tissue EngineeringTatara AM, Shah SR, Lam J, Demian N, Ho T, Shum J, Wong ME, Mikos AG

2nd Place Poster Award: Danielle Wu, Rice University Building Salivary Cell Mini-Modules: A First Step Toward Reconstruction of the Human Salivary GlandWu D, Pradhan-Bhatt S, Cannon K, Chapela P, Hubka K, Harrington D, Ozdemir T, Zakheim D, Jia X, Witt RL, Farach-Carson MC

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2015 Cluster for Regenerative Medicine Symposium

regenerative medicine,cartilage: bronchus repair using bioartificial tissue transplantationHospital Clinic of Barcelona/APthe application of treatments developed to replace tissues damaged by injury or disease. These treatments may involve the use of biochemical techniques to induce tissue regeneration directly at the site of damage or the use of transplantation techniques employing differentiated cells or stem cells, either alone or as part of a bioartificial tissue. Bioartificial tissues are made by seeding cells onto natural or biomimetic scaffolds (see tissue engineering). Natural scaffolds are the total extracellular matrixes (ECMs) of decellularized tissues or organs. In contrast, biomimetic scaffolds may be composed of natural materials, such as collagen or proteoglycans (proteins with long chains of carbohydrate), or built from artificial materials, such as metals, ceramics, or polyester polymers. Cells used for transplants and bioartificial tissues are almost always autogeneic (self) to avoid rejection by the patients immune system. The use of allogeneic (nonself) cells carries a high risk of immune rejection and therefore requires tissue matching between donor and recipient and involves the administration of immunosuppressive drugs.

A variety of autogeneic and allogeneic cell and bioartificial tissue transplantations have been performed. Examples of autogeneic transplants using differentiated cells include blood transfusion with frozen stores of the patients own blood and repair of the articular cartilage of the knee with the patients own articular chondrocytes (cartilage cells) that have been expanded in vitro (amplified in number using cell culture techniques in a laboratory). An example of a tissue that has been generated for autogeneic transplant is the human mandible (lower jaw). Functional bioartificial mandibles are made by seeding autogeneic bone marrow cells onto a titanium mesh scaffold loaded with bovine bone matrix, a type of extracellular matrix that has proved valuable in regenerative medicine for its ability to promote cell adhesion and proliferation in transplantable bone tissues. Functional bioartificial bladders also have been successfully implanted into patients. Bioartificial bladders are made by seeding a biodegradable polyester scaffold with autogeneic urinary epithelial cells and smooth muscle cells.

Another example of a tissue used successfully in an autogeneic transplant is a bioartificial bronchus, which was generated to replace damaged tissue in a patient affected by tuberculosis. The bioartificial bronchus was constructed from an ECM scaffold of a section of bronchial tissue taken from a donor cadaver. Differentiated epithelial cells isolated from the patient and chondrocytes derived from mesenchymal stem cells collected from the patients bone marrow were seeded onto the scaffold.

There are few clinical examples of allogeneic cell and bioartificial tissue transplants. The two most common allogeneic transplants are blood-group-matched blood transfusion and bone marrow transplant. Allogeneic bone marrow transplants are often performed following high-dose chemotherapy, which is used to destroy all the cells in the hematopoietic system in order to ensure that all cancer-causing cells are killed. (The hematopoietic system is contained within the bone marrow and is responsible for generating all the cells of the blood and immune system.) This type of bone marrow transplant is associated with a high risk of graft-versus-host disease, in which the donor marrow cells attack the recipients tissues. Another type of allogeneic transplant involves the islets of Langerhans, which contain the insulin-producing cells of the body. This type of tissue can be transplanted from cadavers to patients with diabetes mellitus, but recipients require immunosuppression therapy to survive.

Cell transplant experiments with paralyzed mice, pigs, and nonhuman primates demonstrated that Schwann cells (the myelin-producing cells that insulate nerve axons) injected into acutely injured spinal cord tissue could restore about 70 percent of the tissues functional capacity, thereby partially reversing paralysis.

embryonic stem cell: scientists conducting research on embryonic stem cellsMauricio LimaAFP/Getty ImagesStudies on experimental animals are aimed at understanding ways in which autogeneic or allogeneic adult stem cells can be used to regenerate damaged cardiovascular, neural, and musculoskeletal tissues in humans. Among adult stem cells that have shown promise in this area are satellite cells, which occur in skeletal muscle fibres in animals and humans. When injected into mice affected by dystrophy, a condition characterized by the progressive degeneration of muscle tissue, satellite cells stimulate the regeneration of normal muscle fibres. Ulcerative colitis in mice was treated successfully with intestinal organoids (organlike tissues) derived from adult stem cells of the large intestine. When introduced into the colon, the organoids attached to damaged tissue and generated a normal-appearing intestinal lining.

In many cases, however, adult stem cells such as satellite cells have not been easily harvested from their native tissues, and they have been difficult to culture in the laboratory. In contrast, embryonic stem cells (ESCs) can be harvested once and cultured indefinitely. Moreover, ESCs are pluripotent, meaning that they can be directed to differentiate into any cell type, which makes them an ideal cell source for regenerative medicine.

Studies of animal ESC derivatives have demonstrated that these cells are capable of regenerating tissues of the central nervous system, heart, skeletal muscle, and pancreas. Derivatives of human ESCs used in animal models have produced similar results. For example, cardiac stem cells from heart-failure patients were engineered to express a protein (Pim-1) that promotes cell survival and proliferation. When these cells were injected into mice that had experienced myocardial infarction (heart attack), the cells were found to enhance the repair of injured heart muscle tissue. Likewise, heart muscle cells (cardiomyocytes) derived from human ESCs improved the function of injured heart muscle tissue in guinea pigs.

Derivatives of human ESCs are likely to produce similar results in humans, although these cells have not been used clinically and could be subject to immune rejection by recipients. The question of immune rejection was bypassed by the discovery in 2007 that adult somatic cells (e.g., skin and liver cells) can be converted to ESCs. This is accomplished by transfecting (infecting) the adult cells with viral vectors carrying genes that encode transcription factor proteins capable of reprogramming the adult cells into pluripotent stem cells. Examples of these factors include Oct-4 (octamer 4), Sox-2 (sex-determining region Y box 2), Klf-4 (Kruppel-like factor 4), and Nanog. Reprogrammed adult cells, known as induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells, are potential autogeneic sources for cell transplantation and bioartificial tissue construction. Such cells have since been created from the skin cells of patients suffering from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and Alzheimer disease and have been used as human models for the exploration of disease mechanisms and the screening of potential new drugs. In one such model, neurons derived from human iPS cells were shown to promote recovery of stroke-damaged brain tissue in mice and rats,
and, in another, cardiomyocytes derived from human iPS cells successfully integrated into damaged heart tissue following their injection into rat hearts. These successes indicated that iPS cells could serve as a cell source for tissue regeneration or bioartificial tissue construction.

Scaffolds and soluble factors, such as proteins and small molecules, have been used to induce tissue repair by undamaged cells at the site of injury. These agents protect resident fibroblasts and adult stem cells and stimulate the migration of these cells into damaged areas, where they proliferate to form new tissue. The ECMs of pig small intestine submucosa, pig and human dermis, and different types of biomimetic scaffolds are used clinically for the repair of hernias, fistulas (abnormal ducts or passageways between organs), and burns.

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regenerative medicine | Britannica.com

Download Cord Blood Stem Cells and Regenerative Medicine PDF
Download PDF Here: http://bit.ly/1GSodzZ.

By: Monet Siler

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Download Cord Blood Stem Cells and Regenerative Medicine PDF - Video

Regenerative Medicine is the process of engineering living, functional cell and tissue-based therapies and administering these to patients to repair or replace tissue or organ function lost due to age, disease, damage, or congenital defects. Target diseases include cancers, diabetes, heart disease, ALS and target disorders include spinal/movement, hearing loss, vision loss, and neurological (i.e., stroke).

Nearly all currently available and development stage regenerative medicine products and therapies utilize biopreservation processes and products in the acquisition of source material, isolation and manipulation of specific cells, and storage and shipment of a final product dose to a patient location. System optimization is critical and biopreservation economics greatly impact product commercialization potential through shelf life impact on distribution, and clinical dose efficacy following preservation.

This market is comprised of nearly 700 commercial companies and numerous other hospital-based transplant centers developing and delivering cellular therapies such as stem cells isolated from bone marrow, peripheral and umbilical cord blood as well as engineered tissue-based products. MedMarket Diligence, LLC, estimates that the current worldwide market for regenerative medicine products and services is growing at 20 percent annually. We expect pre-formulated biopreservation media products such as our HypoThermosol and CryoStor to continue to displace home-brew cocktails, creating demand for clinical grade preservation reagents that will grow at greater than the overall end market rate.

We have shipped our proprietary biopreservation media products to over 200 regenerative medicine customers. We estimate that our products are now incorporated into 30 to 40 regenerative medicine cell- or tissue-based products in pre-clinical and clinical trial stages of development. While this market is still in an early stage, we have secured a valuable position as a supplier of critical reagents to numerous regenerative medicine companies and university based centers.

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Regenerative Medicine - Biolife Solutions, Inc.

Researchers find that brain activity promotes the growth of brain cancer
Stanford Institute for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine researcher Michelle Monje, MD, PhD, has found that normal brain activity creates factors that promote the growth of a brain...

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Researchers find that brain activity promotes the growth of brain cancer - Video