Category Archives: Stem Cell Videos

ScienceDaily (June 11, 2012) Studying mice and humans, researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and their collaborators in Paris have identified two proteins that are required to maintain a supply of stem cells in the developing kidney.

In the presence of the two proteins, FGF9 and FGF20, mouse kidney stem cells stayed alive outside the body longer than previously reported. Though the cells were maintained only five days (up from about two), the work is a small step toward the future goal of growing kidney stem cells in the lab.

In the developing embryo, these early stem cells give rise to adult cells called nephrons, the blood filtration units of the kidneys.

The results appear online June 11 in Developmental Cell.

"When we are born, we get a certain allotment of nephrons," says Raphael Kopan, PhD, the Alan A. and Edith L. Wolff Professor of Developmental Biology. "Fortunately, we have a large surplus. We can donate a kidney -- give away 50 percent of our nephrons -- and still do fine. But, unlike our skin and gut, our kidneys can't build new nephrons."

The skin and the gut have small pools of stem cells that continually renew these organs throughout life. Scientists call such pools of stem cells and their support system a niche. During early development, the embryonic kidney has a stem cell niche as well. But at some point before birth or shortly after, all stem cells in the kidney differentiate to form nephrons, leaving no self-renewing pool of stem cells.

"In other organs, there are cells that specifically form the niche, supporting the stem cells in a protected environment," Kopan says. "But in the embryonic kidney, it seems the stem cells form their own niche, making it a bit more fragile. And the signals and conditions that lead the cells to form this niche have been elusive."

Surprisingly, recent clues to the signals that maintain the embryonic kidney's stem cell niche came from studies of the inner ear. David M. Ornitz, MD, PhD, the Alumni Endowed Professor of Developmental Biology, investigates FGF signaling in mice. Earlier this year, Ornitz and his colleagues published a paper in PLoS Biology showing that FGF20 plays an important role in inner ear development.

"Mice without FGF20 are profoundly deaf," Ornitz says. "While they are otherwise viable and healthy, in some cases we noticed that their kidneys looked small."

Past work from his own lab and others suggested that FGF9, a close chemical cousin of FGF20, might also participate in kidney development. FGF20 and FGF9 are members of a family of proteins known as fibroblast growth factors. In general, members of this family are known to play important and broad roles in embryonic development, tissue maintenance, and wound healing. Mice lacking FGF9 have defects in development of the male urogenital tract and die after birth due to defects in lung development.

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Clues found to way embryonic kidney maintains its fleeting stem cells

Durham, NC (PRWEB) June 11, 2012

Bone grafts grown from purified stem cells originating from fat could lead to a more efficient way to regenerate bone and end the painful operations needed to collect a patients own bone for grafting. The results could have significant impact on those suffering from severe bone injuries or disease.

In a study published in the June issue of STEM CELLS Translational Medicine, researchers were able to demonstrate the potential of a population of stem cells found in human fat to generate bone. They also identified a new factor to stimulate bone growth. The team was made up of scientists from the UCLA-Orthopaedic Hospital Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, the Orthopaedic Hospital Research Center, and the Eli and Edythe Broad Center of Regenerative Medicine and Stem Cell Research at the University of California-Los Angeles (UCLA).

Researchers have long recognized the potential of stem cells harvested from fat which they call adipose-derived stem cells or ASCs in bone engineering. For one thing, stem cells are more easily obtainable from fat than from bone marrow, which also contains stem cells, plus ASCs have already been used successfully to heal skeletal defects in animals. And while the current gold standard for collecting bone for grafting autograft bone, which is that taken from the patient himself has significant disadvantages, including the potential for complications arising from the extended operating time needed to collect it, harvesting stem cells from fat tissue is painless and poses minimal risk to the patient.

However, there are several obstacles to the use of ASCs, including the risk of infection and genetic instability when the cells are isolated and expanded in the lab. As an alternative, researchers have looked at the possibility of using stromal vascular fraction (SVF), which comes from lipoaspirate, the byproduct of a liposuction.

SVF contains a variety of cells, including smooth muscle cells, fibroblasts, adult stem cells and more. In addition, it contains blood cells from the capillaries supplying the fat cells. The SVF has the advantage of being rapidly available (there is no need for culture isolation), but it falls significantly short for bone growth, with studies showing it yields poor and unreliable bone formation.

The main problem is this makeup of heterogeneous cell population, which can lead to unreliable bone formation, Chia Soo, M.D., explained. She and Bruno Pault, Ph.D., and Kang Ting, D.M.D., D.Med.Sc., were the senior corresponding investigators on the study, funded by the California Institute of Regenerative Medicine (CIRM).

So the UCLA team decided to see what would happen if they purified the SVF cells to reduce their inherent heterogeneity and obtain a safer, more efficient stem cell-based therapeutic. Their goal was to isolate a population of stem cells known as perivascular stem cells (PSCs) that surround blood vessels. The team then took the bone grafts grown from the human PSCs and implanted them in mice to compare their bone-forming capacity with that of traditionally derived SVF.

The results exceeded expectation.

The purified human PSCs formed significantly more bone in comparison to traditionally derived SVF by all parameters, Aaron James, M.D., the studys lead author, said. This is true in terms of potency, identity and purity.

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Growing Bone from Stem Cells in Fat Could End Painful Graft Operations

London, June 10 : Scientists have grown a human bone from stem cells taken from fat, paving the way for repair or replacement of broken bones with those grown from a patient's own cells.

The researchers started with stem cells taken from fat tissue, which took nearly a month to grow into sections of fully-formed living human bone with a maximum size of two inches.

An Israeli biotechnology company that has been working with academics on the technology, will be conducting the first patient trial later this year, the Telegraph reports.

Avinoam Kadouri, profoessor and head of the scientific advisory board for Bonus BioGroup, said: "There is a need for artificial bones for injuries and in operations. We use three dimensional structures to fabricate the bone in the right shape and geometry. We can grow these bones outside the body and then transplant it to the patient at the right time.

"By scanning the damaged bone area, the implant should fit perfectly and merge with the surrounding tissue. There are no problems with rejection as the cells come from the patient's own body," added Kadouri.

The technology, which has been developed along with researchers at the Technion Institute of Research in Israel, uses three dimensional scans of the damaged bone to build a gel-like scaffold that matches the shape.

Stem cells, known as mesenchymal stem cells, which have the capacity to develop into many other types of cell in the body, are obtained from the patient's fat using liposuction.

These are then grown into living bone on the scaffold inside a "bioreactor" - an automated machine that provides the right conditions to encourage the cells to develop into bone.

Already animals have successfully received bone transplants. The scientists were able to insert almost an inch of lab-grown human bone into the middle section of a rat's leg bone, where it successfully merged with the remaining animal bone.

The technique could ultimately allow doctors to replace bones that have been smashed in accidents, fill in defects where bone is missing such as cleft palate, or carry out reconstructive plastic surgery.

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Scientists grow human bones from fat

Functioning liver from stem cells

(AFP) / 9 June 2012

Japanese researchers have created a functioning human liver from stemcells, a report said, raising hopes for the manufacture of artificial organs for those in need of transplants.

A team of scientists transplanted induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells into the body of a mouse, where it grew into a small, but working, human liver, the Yomiuri Shimbun said.

Stemcells are frequently harvested from embryos, which are then discarded, a practice some people find morally objectionable. But iPS cells which have the potential to develop into any body tissue can be taken from adults.

A team led by professor Hideki Taniguchi at Yokohama City University developed human iPS cells into precursor cells, which they then transplanted into a mouses head to take advantage of increased blood flow.

The cells grew into a human liver 5 millimetres in size that was capable of generating human proteins and breaking down drugs, the Yomiuri reported. The breakthrough opens the door to the artificial creation of human organ. Taniguchis research could be an important bridge between basic research and clinical application but faces various challenges before it can be put into medical practice, the Yomiuri said.

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Functioning liver from stem cells

A medical breakthrough by Australian scientists has shown how sheets of stem cells grown on contact lenses can repair damaged eyes.

The treatment transfers minuscule strips of adult stem cells from specifically designed contact lenses onto the eye, to help rebuild the surface of the cornea.

The world-first research could pave the way for an effective treatment for painful caustic or thermal burns, or severe inflammation of the surface of the eye.

Centre for Eye Research Australia researcher Karl David Brown said it was the first time they had proved cells had transferred from the contact lens to the eye to rebuild the surface.

During the trial, limbal stem cells, which function naturally to repair the eye, were taken from the edge of the cornea. Sheets containing hundreds of thousands of cells were grown on contact lenses.

They were inserted in the eye and left for four days. During this time the cells transferred from the lens to the wounded eye.

There are already experimental treatments using human amnion, a membrane that surrounds an embryo, but sourcing the donor tissue after a baby is born and ensuring it is of sufficient quality is difficult.

Brown said the benefit of this new technique was that the cells could be harvested from the patient's own eyes or, if they are too damaged, from donor tissue. Small human trials of the technique are about to start.

"I'm cautiously optimistic that the human trials will yield positive results," Brown said.

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Stem cells used to repair damaged eyes in world-first trial

All in the eyes...the medical breakthrough is a world first. Source: Supplied

A MEDICALl breakthrough by Australian scientists has shown how sheets of stem cells grown on contact lenses can repair damaged eyes.

The treatment transfers minuscule strips of adult stem cells from specifically designed contact lenses onto the eye, to help rebuild the surface of the cornea.

The world-first research could pave the way for an effective treatment for painful caustic or thermal burns, or severe inflammation of the surface of the eye.

Centre for Eye Research Australia researcher Karl David Brown said it was the first time they had proved cells had transferred from the contact lens to the eye to rebuild the surface.

During the trial, limbal stem cells, which function naturally to repair the eye, were taken from the edge of the cornea. Sheets containing hundreds of thousands of cells were grown on contact lenses.

They were inserted in the eye and left for four days. During this time the cells transferred from the lens to the wounded eye.

There are already experimental treatments using human amnion, a membrane that surrounds an embryo, but sourcing the donor tissue after a baby is born and ensuring it is of sufficient quality is difficult.

Brown said the benefit of this new technique was that the cells could be harvested from the patient's own eyes or, if they are too damaged, from donor tissue. Small human trials of the technique are about to start.

"I'm cautiously optimistic that the human trials will yield positive results," Brown said.

Excerpt from:
Stem cells used to repair eyes

A team of scientists has discovered what could be a novel source for researching and potentially treating Alzheimer's disease and other conditions involving the destruction of brain cells.

Researchers at the University of California San Francisco-affiliated Gladstone Institutes converted skin cells from mice and humans into brain stem cells with the use of a protein called Sox2. Using only this protein to transform the skin cells into neuron stem cells is unusual. Normally, the conversion process is much more complex.

Neuron stem cells are cells that can be changed into the nerve cells and the cells that support them in the brain. The neuronal stem cells formed in this study are unique because they were prepared in a way the prevented them from becoming tumors, which is what often happens as stem cells differentiate, explained David Teplow, professor of neurology and director of the Easton Center for Alzheimer's Disease Research at UCLA. Teplow was not involved in the study, but is familiar with this type of research.

These immature brain stem cells then developed into different types of functional brain cells, which were eventually able to be integrated into mouse brains.

Jonathan Selig/Getty Images

The idea that these cells can become fully functioning brain tissue is significant, the authors explained, because by becoming part of the brain, the cells can replace the cells killed off by the disease process.

These cells also offer a potential way to learn about the mechanisms behind neurodegenerative disorders as well as lead to research into new drugs, explained Dr. Yadong Huang, a study co-author and associate investigator at the Gladstone Institute of Neurological Disease.

"The next step is, we are trying to get these skin cells from patients with this disease so we can reprogram and convert the diseased cells into these neuron stem cells and develop those into neurons in culture," he said.

After that, researchers can study how these diseases develop based on what's observed in culture dishes.

"It's really hard to get neurons from human brains for research, and now, we can generate them," Huang said. "Secondly, we can do some drug screening. If we have patient-specific neurons in culture, we can test some or develop some drugs to see how they work on these neurons."

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Skin Cells Turned Into Brain Cells

06-06-2012 13:09 Mesenchymal stem cell homing to tissue damage, umbilical cord stem cells historically used for anti-aging, mesenchymal stem cells role in immune system modulation, inflammation reduction and stimulating tissue regeneration, donor stem cell safety and testing, the role of HLA matching in donated umbilical cord-derived stem cells, umbilical cord blood safety data and historical use in blood transfusions, allogeneic stem cell persistence in human mothers. Treatment information at More information on Dr. Riordan at

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Neil Riordan PhD - Stem Cell Therapy for Spinal Cord Injury (Part 3 of 5) || Stem Cell Treatments - Video

Scientists previously thought heart attacks and strokes were caused by smooth muscle cells Stem cells multiply and caused arteries to harden Heart attacks affect 90,000 and strokes 150,000 in Britain every year

By Emma Reynolds

PUBLISHED: 11:17 EST, 6 June 2012 | UPDATED: 11:17 EST, 6 June 2012

The real culprit behind heart attacks and strokes is stem cells, researchers have claimed in a landmark study that could revolutionise treatment.

Until now, scientists thought vascular health problems were triggered by smooth muscle cells.

Now a team from the University of California in Berkeley have found a previously unknown stem cell, which causes the arteries to harden when it multiplies.

Real hope: The cells can multiply and cause arteries to harden, blocking the blood's route to the heart or brain

The groundbreaking work is set to completely change how heart attacks and strokes are treated, dramatically cutting the number of deaths, according the study published today in the journal Nature Communications.

Heart attacks are the most common reason for people to need emergency treatment. Around 90,000 people in Britain have one each year - of whom around a third will die as a result.

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Stem cells are identified as real culprit behind heart attacks after case of mistaken identity that could ...

It's always troubling to see a misunderstanding concerning a recent scientific discovery. The latest concerns an Israeli team of scientists, led by Lior Gepstein, that converted skin cells from two patients with heart attack into stem cells and then heart cells.

SourceFed, one of my favorite channels on YouTube, proclaimed that Gepstein's study means that a cure for heart disease is "10, 15 years out." Similar statements were also circulated by The Guardian, The Los Angeles Times, CBS News, and others.

However, the claims that SourceFed and other news outlets have made are not true. If anything, the field of heart regeneration is moving away from what the study did. If there is a cure for heart attack in 10 to 15 years, it will not be because of this study.

Generating stem cells from skin cells is relatively old news. This feat was first performed in 2006 for mice (2007 for humans) concurrently by two teams of scientists led by Shinya Yamanaka in Japan and James Thomson in the United States, respectively. Since then, the technology has evolved so fast that generating heart cells from stem cells is truly nothing new.

Stem cells often differentiate into heart cells, or cardiomyocytes, without much technical intervention. Even I, a mere undergraduate student, have generated beating heart cells several times without much trouble, from mice and rat skin cells. And I'm not even in the field of heart regeneration. I work with stem cells in neurobiology.

The technique to generate heart cells from skin-derived stem cells (or induced pluripotent stem cells) has existed for a long time. After a brief search on Google Scholar, I found a paper published in 2008 detailing how to generate heart cells from skin cells. This may not seem like a long time ago, but in the stem-cell world, that's almost an eon.

So if we have been able to generate heart cells for such a long time, why has no one actually successfully transplanted heart cells into patients? One of the reasons is that there are so many different problems with not only transplanting heart cells onto a beating heart but also with the induced pluripotent stem cells that are derived from skin cells.

When a heart is damaged, scar tissues grow over the damaged part of the heart. The scar tissue does not function like regular heart cells. Instead of beating, the scar tissue just sits there, not doing anything and getting in the way of the beating heart. It's just like a scab on your arm from a scrape. The only difference is that the scab eventually comes off, because your skin is constantly making new cells, but the scar on your heart doesn't, because heart cells rarely regenerate, if at all.

Transplanting new heart cells without removing the scars is like putting a new layer of skin over the old scab and expecting the scab to go away. The old scab doesn't go away. More likely, the transplanted tissue will just die off.

As a result, instead of trying to transplant new tissue, the field of heart regeneration is now trying to transform the cells in scar tissue into beating heart cells. Though there are also problems with this new direction, it opens up ways of solving a whole host of other problems that plague heart-cell transplantation.

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Rui Dai: Our Misunderstanding of Stem Cells