Category Archives: Stem Cells

British researchers say they've gotten embryonic stem cells to turn into precursors to reproductive cells

WebMD News from HealthDay

By Robert Preidt

HealthDay Reporter

WEDNESDAY, Dec. 24, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- Researchers say they have used human embryonic stem cells to create cells that develop into eggs and sperm.

While this had already been done using rodent stem cells, this is the first time that these types of cells -- called primordial germ cells -- have been produced efficiently using human stem cells, according to the team at the University of Cambridge in England.

"The creation of primordial germ cells is one of the earliest events during early mammalian development," study first author Naoko Irie said in a university news release.

"It's a stage we've managed to recreate using stem cells from mice and rats, but until now few researchers have done this systematically using human stem cells. It has highlighted important differences between embryo development in humans and rodents that may mean findings in mice and rats may not be directly extrapolated to humans."

The study is published in the Dec. 24 issue of the journal Cell.

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Scientists Get Closer to Producing Egg, Sperm From Stem Cells

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Newswise (New York City) A new test may reveal which patients will respond to treatment for graft versus host disease (GVHD), an often life-threatening complication of stem cell transplants (SCT) used to treat leukemia and other blood disorders, according to a study led by researchers at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and published online today in the journal Lancet Haematology and in print in the January issue.

Patients with fatal blood cancers like leukemia often require allogenic stem cell SCT to survive. Donor stem cells are transplanted to a recipient, but not without the risk of developing GVHD, a life-threatening complication and major cause of death after SCT. The disease, which can be mild to severe, occurs when the transplanted donor cells (known as the graft) attack the patient (referred to as the host). Symptom severity, however, does not accurately define how patients will respond to treatment and patients are often treated alike with high-dose steroids. Although SCT cures cancer in 50 percent of the patients, 25 percent die from relapsed cancer and there remaining go into remission but later succumb to effects of GVHD.

High dose steroids is the only proven treatment for GVHD, said James L. M. Ferrara, MD, DSc, Ward-Coleman Chair in Cancer Medicine Professor at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, Director of Hematologic Malignancies Translational Research Center at Tisch Cancer Institute at Mount Sinai. Those with low-risk GVHD are often over-treated and face significant side-effects from treatment. Patients with high risk GVHD are undertreated and the GVHD progresses, often with fatal consequences. Our goal is to provide the right treatment for each patient. We hope to identify those patients at higher risk and design an aggressive intervention while tailoring a less-aggressive approach for those with low-risk.

Dr. Ferrara, along with a multi-center team of researchers, developed and tested this new scoring system using almost 500 patient blood samples with newly diagnosed GVHD in varying grades from two different centers. They used three validated biomarkers TNFR1, ST2 and Reg3 to create an algorithm that calculated the probability of non-relapse mortality (usually caused by GVHD) that provided three distinct risk scores to predict the patients response to GVHD treatment.

The acid test was to evaluate the algorithm in a validation set of 300 additional patients from twenty different SCT centers throughout the US. The algorithm worked perfectly, and the cumulative incidence of non-relapse mortality significantly increased as the GVHD score increased, and so the response rate to primary GVHD treatment decreased.

This new scoring system will help identify patient who may not respond to standard treatments, and may require an experimental and more aggressive approach, said Dr. Ferrara. And it will also help guide treatment for patients with lower-risk GVHD who may be over-treated. This will allow us to personalize treatment at the onset of the disease. Future algorithms will prove increasingly useful to develop precision medicine for all SCT patients.

In order to capitalize on this discovery, Dr. Ferrara has created the Mount Sinai Acute GVHD International Consortium (MAGIC) which consists of a group of ten SCT centers in the US and Europe who will collaborate to use this new scoring system to test new treatments for acute GVHD. Dr. Ferrara and colleagues have also written a protocol to treat high-risk GVHD that has been approved by the FDA.

Co-collaborators included University of Michigan, University of Regensburg, and the Blood and Marrow Clinical Trials Network.

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Test Predicts Response to Early Treatment for Dangerous Complication of Stem Cells Transplants Used in Leukemia Patients

Haruko Obakata caused a sensation earlier this year with papers, now discredited and retracted, that claimed a simple method for creating pluripotent stem cells

A mouse embryo injected with cells made pluripotent through stress, tagged with a fluorescent protein. Credit: Haruko Obokata

Haruko Obokata, the stem-cell biologist whose papers caused a sensation earlier this year before being retracted, has resigned from the RIKEN Center for Developmental Biology in Kobe, Japan.

Her emotional resignation letter was posted on RIKENs website on December 19 alongside results of the organizations own investigation, which failed to confirm her claims of a simple method to create pluripotent stem cells.

Such cells are scientifically valuable because they can develop into most other cells types, from brain to muscle. But they are difficult to make.

Obokatas methodknown as stimulus-triggered acquisition of pluripotency, or STAPwas published in Nature in January. However, the results immediately came under suspicion, and the papers were retracted in July. A few weeks later, one of the papers co-authors, Yoshiki Sasai, took his own life.

Obokata wrote she could not find words enough to apologize... for troubling so many people at RIKEN and other places.

In an accompanying statement, RIKEN president Ryoji Noyori wrote that Obokata had been subject to extreme stress over the affair, and that in accepting her resignation he hoped to save her "further mental burden".

This article is reproduced with permission and was first published on December 19, 2014.

2014 Scientific American, a Division of Nature America, Inc.

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Scientist Resigns as Stem-Cell Creation Method Is Discredited

DETROITGordie Howes family says the hockey great has made a miraculous improvement after he participated in a stem cell clinical trial.

The 86-year-old Howe had a serious stroke in late October, but in a statement released through the Detroit Red Wings on Friday, his family said his physical therapists have been astonished by his progress.

Executives from Stemedica Cell Technologies contacted the family and facilitated Howes participation in the clinical trial. He had a two-day, non-surgical treatment that included neural stem cells injected into the spinal canal and mesenchymal stem cells by intravenous infusion.

For the first time since the stroke, Howe has been able to walk with minimal effort and converse comfortably with family.

The treatment included neural stem cells injected into the spinal canal on Day 1 and mesenchymal stem cells by intravenous infusion on Day 2, the family said. His response was truly miraculous. At the end of Day 1 he was walking with minimal effort for the first time since his stroke. By Day 2 he was conversing comfortably with family and staff at the clinic.

The family says Howe has been able to help out with daily household chores, and when tested, his ability to name items has gone from less than 25 per cent before the treatment to 85 per cent.

Although his short-term memory, strength, endurance and co-ordination have plenty of room for improvement, we are hopeful he will continue to improve in the months to come, the family said.

As a family, we are thrilled that dads quality of life has greatly improved, and his progress has exceeded our greatest expectations.

The rest is here:
Family credit Gordie Howes recovery to stem cell trial

Cytokines, Stem Cells and Skincare Lecture by Dr Dave Woynarowski
Discover the Latest Anti-Aging Skin Care Technologies from a Board-Certified Anti-Aging Doctor! with Dr. Dave Woynarowski http://rg-cell.com/dr-daves-talk-ammg-las-vegas-video/

By: RG-Cell Stem Cell Suport

Originally posted here:
Cytokines, Stem Cells and Skincare Lecture by Dr Dave Woynarowski - Video

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See the article here:
Stem cells give Howe 'miraculous' recovery

Six-year-old Pearland resident Tucker Beau Hyatt has known that he has been battling Monstritis for a long time. He has taken on the guise of Batman (shhh!) in order to beat it.

Monstritis was the then two-year-old Tuckers way of understanding his diagnosis of Systemic Juvenile Idiopathic Arthritis (JIA), a rare form of Rheumatoid Arthritis that affects about 300,000 children in the U.S. Over time, the membranes in the joints wear down, causing severe pain, loss of appetite and mobility.

Tuckers mother, Linsey Hyatt, recalls that it all started with a very high fever and a rash all over Tuckers body. We took him to the pediatrician thinking it was just some sort of infection, she said.

The blood work came back all over the place, and the youngster was referred to an Infectious Disease Specialist at Texas Tech.

The doctor took one look at Tucker and his chart and instantly knew what it was, Hyatt said.

By that time, Tucker had stopped eating and was unable to walk. We went to a rheumatoid specialist in Austin, which was the closest doctor to Midland, where we were living at the time, recalls Hyatt. They started him on chemotherapy, which was awful.

Tuckers mom and dad, Todd Hyatt, never stopped searching for a better solution to help their son, who was slowly wasting away from the disease. This is not a quick thing, said Linsey. Its slow and painful.

The Hyatts moved to Pearland in June of 2013 because of Todds job. They had become active with the Arthritis Foundation right after Tuckers diagnosis and attended an RAF luncheon in Austin featuring former Houston Oiler Earl Campbell, who suffers from osteoarthritis, in February 2014.

It was there that they first heard about Celltex, a company that facilitates stem cell therapy for RA, Multiple Sclerosis, Parkinsons and other autoimmune diseases.

We wanted to be able to tell Tucker Beau that we had done everything possible to help him, said Linsey.

Original post:
Pearland boy makes remarkable recovery via stem cells

A Japanese scientist once hailed a hero resigned Friday (19.12.2014) after acknowledging she could not reproduce the results of her groundbreaking "STAP" stem cell research in a government lab under video camera surveillance.

Haruko Obokata's highly publicized fall from grace led to critiques against the international science journal which published her research, to reforms at the Riken Center for Developmental Biology (CDB) in Kobe, and contributed to the suicide of co-author and respected stem cell scientist, Yoshiki Sasai.

"Now, I am just exhausted. For the results to end this way is just perplexing," Obokata said in her statement Friday. The researcher, who added she could not find the words for an apology, had refused media appearances since April.

Two science papers written by Obokata and Sasai were published in the international science journal "Nature" in January. The researchers claimed they could create stem cells out of blood cells - albeit in mice - through the use of an acid solution. They called the process Stimulus-Triggered Acquisition of Pluripotency (STAP).

The STAP process would have greatly simplified the creation of stem cells from other cells.

Researchers believe stem cells will one day be used to treat a range of diseases, from Parkinson's Disease to blindness, since they can regenerate or repair damaged tissues in the human body.

Yoshiki Sasai was 52

However, scientists quickly discovered mistakes and contradictions in the STAP papers' data and picture captions, and labs around the world were never able to replicate their findings.

In June, Obakata retracted the papers.

In August, co-author Sasai hanged himself.

Read more:
Japanese scientist Obokata fails to recreate 'provocative' STAP stem cells and resigns

Miodrag Stojkovic/SPL

Some types of human embryonic stem cells can now be patented in Europe.

Europes highest court has ruled that human embryonic stem cells made from unfertilized eggs can be patented on the basis that they lack the potential to turn into a human being.

The cells in question are created through a process called parthenogenesis, after the Greek words for virgin and birth. In some animals, parthenogenesis is a means of asexual reproduction but human cells created in this way are not capable of properly developing.

The ruling, issued on 18 December by the European Court of Justice, backtracks on the court's more general, 2011 ban on obtaining patents for human embryonic stem cells (ESCs).

The ban had come in response to a patent sought by stem-cell scientist Oliver Brstle of the University of Bonn, Germany, for neurons made from ESCs. As well as banning patents that involve the destruction of cells capable of forming human embryos, the court specifically forbade patents on ESCs made from 'parthenote' eggs, stating that they are capable of commencing the process of development which leads to a human being.

But many scientists denounced the decision, arguing that it would slow the development of cell-based therapies. We have known for a very long time that parthenogenetic (or parthenote) embryos are not capable of developing very far after implantation, says Robin Lovell-Badge, a stem-cell scientist at the National Institute for Medical Research in London.

International Stem Cell Corporation, a biotechnology company in Carlsbad, California, challenged the judgement after a UK application it made for two patents was rejected. The patents covered methods to generate corneal tissue from ESCs that had been made from egg cells, or ova, via parthenogenesis.

In its 18 December ruling, the court said: "The mere fact that a parthenogenetically-activated human ovum commences a process of development is not sufficient for it to be regarded as a human embryo." It is now up to UK courts to decide whether the cells generated by International Stem Cell Corporation qualify for patent protection.

Julian Hitchcock, a biotechnology lawyer at Lawford Davies Denoon in London, says that the courts decision raises questions about the advice that underpinned the 2011 findings. The ruling could spur further challenges to the patent ban, he adds.

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European court clears way for stem-cell patents

The Asahi Shimbun via Getty Images

In a January 2014 press conference in Kobe, Japan, Haruko Obokata points to microscope pictures of mouse cells engineered to glow green to indicate a stem-cell status.

Haruko Obokata, the Japanese stem-cell biologist whose papers caused a sensation earlier this year before being retracted, has not succeeded in an attempt to replicate the controversial experiments, the Japanese media has reported.

The original papers, which Obokata co-authored and published in Nature in January1, 2, claimed to provide a way of producing 'pluripotent' stem cells cells with the ability to develop into almost any cell type in the body by a much easier route than used by earlier methods, including a technology that won the 2012 physiology Nobel prize. Obokata's technique involved inducing pluripotency in mouse adult cells by subjecting them to stress, such as physical pressure or exposure to acid. The technique was called stimulus-triggered acquisition of pluripotency, or STAP.

The papers garnered much excitement, but immediately came underattack by social mediathat noted apparently manipulated images. Investigations by the RIKEN Center for Developmental Biology in Kobe, where Obokata works, found that she had committed scientific misconduct, and thepapers were retracted.

Obokata, however, stood by her results, and the RIKEN Center gave her until the end of November to prove that she could reproduce them.

In the experiments, the cells were engineered to glow with green fluorescence when they expressed genes related to pluripotency. Obokata's repeat experiments reportedly produced such green glowing cells. But this is only a preliminary test and involves just a few such cells. More rigorous tests, including the introduction of the cells to a mouse embryo to see whether they could contribute to various tissues in a developing animal, did not produce the hoped-for results.

An official announcement will be made at a press conference on 19 December.

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Still no stem cells via easy 'STAP' path