INTERNATIONAL REGENERATIVE MEDICINE COMMUNITY TO CONVENE FOR 13TH WORLD STEM CELL SUMMIT IN MIAMI, JANUARY 2018

The 13ththWorld Stem Cell Summit http://www.worldstemcellsummit.com is taking place January 23-26, 2018 at the Hyatt Regency Miami. Produced by the nonprofit Regenerative Medicine Foundation (RMF), the event is the global ecosystem meeting for advanced therapies; fostering public understanding, promoting positive policy initiatives and collaborations.

The World Stem Cell Summit will be co-located with the fields premier industry partnering event, Phacilitate Leaders Forum, Cell & Gene Therapy World and Immunotherapy World.

In addition to compelling keynotes, plenary and focus sessions, thediverse four-day program includesexpert lunch roundtables; a centrally located Expo packed with innovators in industry, academia and government; a poster forum showcasing science and policy research; the galaStem Cell Action Awards Dinnerhttp://regmedfoundation.org/awards/; as well as many exclusive networking and partnering opportunities.

RMF Executive Director Bernard Siegel, founder and co-chair of the Summit said, We are proud to select Miami to be our host for the next World Stem Cell Summit. Miami is often referred to as the 'City of the Future' and in 2018 it will be the center of the stem cell universe. Its the perfect venue for Summit attendees to gain knowledge, network and collect opportunities to advance their goals, in a superlative, cosmopolitan setting.

ABOUT RMFRegenerative Medicine Foundation is dedicated to accelerating regenerative medicine to improve health and deliver cures. RMF pursues its mission by producing its flagship World Stem Cell Summit, honoring leaders through the Stem Cell Action Awards http://worldstemcellsummit.com/stem-cell-action-awards/, publishing the World Stem Cell Report and RegMed Newsletter, organizing educational initiatives such as the upcoming Regenerative Medicine Essentials Course http://www.wakehealth.edu/Research/WFIRM/RMEssentials/Regenerative-Medicine-Essentials.htm and fostering strategic collaborations.

For more information about RMF, visitwww.regmedfoundation.orgor contact Bernard Siegel directly at Bernard@regmedfoundation.org.

Attachments:

A photo accompanying this announcement is available at http://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/64ef8cd8-84a3-4130-8a8f-f1e020eaeba3

Human Life Could Be Extended Indefinitely, Study Suggests

Goosebumps, tears and tenderness: what it means to be moved

Are over-the-counter painkillers a waste of money?

Does an anomaly in the Earth's magnetic field portend a coming pole reversal?

Immunotherapy: Training the body to fight cancer

Do vegetarians live longer? Probably, but not because they're vegetarian

Could a contraceptive app be as good as the pill?

Some scientific explanations for alien abduction that aren't so out of this world

Society actually does want policies that benefit future generations

Six cosmic catastrophes that could wipe out life on Earth

Big Pharma Starts Using Cannabis For Making Drugs In Earnest

Do you need to worry if your baby has a flat head?

Read more here:
INTERNATIONAL REGENERATIVE MEDICINE COMMUNITY TO ... - EconoTimes

To Dr. Mark Gomelsky, a professor at the University of Wyoming, genetically engineered therapeutic cells are like troops on a mission.

The first act is training. Using genetic editing tools such as CRISPR, scientists can train a patients own cells to specifically recognize and attack a variety of enemies, including rogue tumor soldiers and HIV terrorists.

Then comes the incursion. Engineered cells are surgically implanted to the target site, where theyre left to immediately carry out the mission. The problem, says Gomelsky, is adding a command center that could coordinate their activities in real time according to the developing situation, such as telling cells when to activate and when to stop.

The problem has been figuring out a way to bundle a command system with the cellular implants, so that control signals come from within the body. Now, thanks to a new study published in Science Translational Medicine, were one step closer to smart cell therapies, where the command center forms a single closed-loop unit with the engineered soldiers.

In an elegant feat of synthetic biology, a team of Chinese scientists married optogenetics with cellular engineering, generating live cells that can release insulin when bathed under red light.

The cells were then embedded with tiny LED lights inside a hydrogel and transplanted under the skin of diabetic mice. Andget thisthe entire system was controlled with a custom Android app, which remotely turns on the implanted LEDs and activates insulin-producing cells based on the level of circulating blood sugar levels.

After about four hours of light each day, the diabetic mice showed stabilized blood sugar and normal insulin production for over two weeks.

According to lead author Dr. Haifeng Ye at East China Normal University in Shanghai, the goal is to engineer a smart circuit that can sense, monitor and profile insulin levels in the bloodstream, 24 hours a day, using only a smartphone.

And thats just the beginning. These remote-controlled cells offer proof-of-concept evidence that cell-based semiautomatic therapies are possible. This could pave the way for a new era of personalized, digitized and globalized precision medicine, the authors say.

Controlling a cells activity is hard. Drugs are a common method, but as anyone whos ever taken an Advil for a blaring headache can attest to, drugs have a significant onset time lag.

So when scientists discovered that they could precisely control the activity of mammalian cells with light, the field of optogenetics took off like a rocket launcher.

Heres how it works: most of our cells dont usually respond to light, but those in algae do. Algae have several types of light-activated proteins that sit on their membranes, and in response to certain wavelengths of light, these proteins open up like a canal, allowing ions and molecules from outside the cell to flow in. Depending on what those molecules are, this either activates or inhibits the cell.

About a decade ago, scientists realized they could pluck these light-responsive proteins channelrhodopsins from algae, and insert them into mammalian cells. The result? Depending on the cell type, optogenetics can reverse blindness, restore heart rhythms, incept memories into nave mice, drive satiated mice to binge eat or turn on their predatory instincts.

Without doubt, optogenetics is powerful. But because scientists need to use gene therapy to insert channelrhodopsin into cells, translating the method to humans has been tough (although clinical trials are in the works).

This is where cell therapy comes in. Rather than trying to insert a gene into cells inside the body, its much easier to tweak a cells wiring in the lab before transplanting them. Thats the approach that Ye and team took for their smart insulin-pumping cells.

The team first engineered a multi-modular protein, so that it responded to far-red light by activating the genes that produce insulin. Unlike previous generations of light-sensing proteins that were leaky, this new construct had very low background activity in the dark.

To see if the circuit worked, the scientist embedded the cells with tiny biocompatible LED lights into a hydrogel and implanted them under the skin of diabetic mice. Then, he used an external transmitting coil to turn on LEDs through electromagnetic induction and voilainsulin in the bloodstream.

Once the basic system worked, the team went on to engineer a command center. Ye credited his inspiration to the SmartHome project, which seeks to create wireless homes furnished with smartphone-regulated electrical appliances like the Nest thermometer.

At the heart of their SmartController system is a home server box that contains a microprocessor unit chip and a WiFi-powered data receiver unit. To measure blood sugar levels, the team designed a custom digital glucometer that can transmit data to an Android app using Bluetooth. The app relays the glucose measurements to the control box, where it gets analyzed in real-time to control the magnetic transmitting coil.

If blood sugar levels are abnormally high, for example, the controller activates the electromagnetic field generator, which in turn switches on the implanted LED lights.

This triggers cells to release just enough insulin to revert blood sugar levels back to normal without causing low blood sugar symptoms.

We programmed the microcontroller chip to automatically translate blood sugar thresholds into different LED illumination strengths, which allows fully self-sufficient activation of antidiabetic cells based on blood sugar levels, the authors say.

The entire process can be tracked through the app interface, so that doctors could easily intervene in case of unforeseeable errors.

The whole process takes about two hours for sky-high blood sugar levels to return to non-diabetic levels. Once there, the system steadily maintained normal blood sugar levels for 15 days with no observable side effects, all without outside intervention.

This exciting accomplishment is a tribute to an ambitious but careful system design, rigorous optimization and meticulous testing, says Gomelsky, who was not involved in the study.

The current rendition of SmartController is only semiautomatic, in that the team has to manually draw blood from the diabetic mice to feed to the glucometer.

This is easy to tacklescientists just have to replace the glucometer with a continuous glucose monitor, implanted inside the body to provide continuous data to the smartphone app around the clock.

A tad trickier is the power problem. For the transmitting coils to reliably activate the implanted LED lights, the animals had to be within a certain distance from the coil, which limits movement. The team is now looking into replacing electromagnetic induction with biocompatible batteries to power the lights, and also avoiding exposure to electromagnetic radiation.

As with all cell therapies, the system will have to work in patient-derived cells or other cell types that wont generate an immune response after implantation.

With the FDA approving the first closed-circuit automatic insulin pump last year, Yes optogentics-meets-cell-therapy system may not ever hit the market. But thats not the point.

How soon should we expect to see people on the street wearing fashionable LED wristbands that irradiate implanted cells engineered to produce genetically encoded drugs under the control of a smartphone? asks Gomesky rhetorically.

Not just yet, he answers, but this study offers an exciting glimpse into the promising future of smart-cell therapies and what may soon be possible.

Image Credit: Shutterstock

Visit link:
These Cells Are Engineered to Be Controlled by a Smartphone - Singularity Hub

Iran is expanding investment in stem cell research and its application in various therapies, particularly for hard-to-treat diseases, through the Office of the Vice- Presidency for Science and Technology. As a result of the increase in the number of companies active in the domain of stem cells in the past three years, more than 400 products are processed in the country, indicating a multifold growth compared with the eight-year tenure of previous administration when there were fewer than 50 knowledge-based firms in total.

There are over 40 knowledgebased firms in the field of stem cell and regenerative medicine alone in Iran today, said Amir Ali Hamidiyeh, secretary of the Headquarters for Development of Stem Cell Science and Technology (HDSCST). He made the statement at a press briefing for the second National Festival and International Congress on Stem Cell Sciences and Technologies and Regenerative Medicine to be held July 13- 15 in Tehran, Mehr News Agency reports. According to the conference secretariat, 1,444 people have signed up to attend the event from across the world, including from Iraq, India, Pakistan, Jordan, Russia, Australia, Germany, China, Britain and South Korea. They all are among their countrys respected figures in centers with high academic standing.

The congress is co-sponsored by the Vice-Presidency for Science and Technology and Council on Development of Stem Cell Sciences and Technology. So far, eight stem-cell therapy products for use in hospitals have been produced at the HDSCST laboratories. Manufacturinglicenses have been granted for anadditional number, while others are on thewait list.

Prior to 2014, only 25 knowledgebased companies had applied to operate in this field, of which only one was actively producing quality stem cell products, Hamidiyeh pointed out.

But since then, over 25 workgroups have been formed in cooperation with experts in the specific sciences. Stem cells are cells that have the ability to divide and develop into many different cell types in the body during early life and growth. Stem-cell therapy is the use of stem cells to treat or prevent a disease or condition. Bone marrow transplant is the most widely used stem-cell therapy, but some therapies derived from umbilical cord blood are also in use.

Future of Medicine in Stem

Cells The future of medicine is interrelated with stem cell therapy and the treatment ofrefractory and incurable diseases is in this field of medicine, according to Dr. Ahmad Vosouq Dizaj, the clinical deputy of Royan Institute. Having access to engineering sciences as well as the combination of biology and medicine can play a crucial role in redressing health problems, he said. Stem cells have the ability to replace damaged cells and treat disease. They can also be used to study diseases and provide a resource for testing new medical treatments. The use of stem cells reduces the risk of viral diseases transmission and incidence of Graft Versus Host Disease (GVHD). The ability to perform organ transplants is among the benefits ofumbilical cord blood transfusion.Using stems cells is also one of thebest ways to treat blood diseases sincethe method has a success rate of 70%worldwide.

Storage of stem cells is a valuable investment. So far, 27 cord blood banks have been launched across the country. There are two types: public and private banks for stem cell storage. The former does not charge a fee for storage. But in the latter, the cost of collection and genetictesting is about $645 and the annualcharge for storage is $33, according toISNA.Iran is a leading country in biomedicalresearch. Researchers and physicians have been successfully performing bone marrow transplants during the past fewyears.Irans stem cell research is centeredat the Royan Institute for ReproductiveBiomedicine, Stem Cell Biology andTechnology, located in northern Tehran.

The rest is here:
Growth in Stem Cell Research - Financial Tribune

White Papers are used often by Biotech companies as a tool to secure financing and US Stem Cell Inc (OTCMKTS:USRM)utilized a White Paper Series to open the eyes of investors as to how significant the results were. Normally this prompts those who take the time to read them and creates an Ah Ha, moment where the light goes on for the investor.

If you look at the timing of the White Paper released by Kristen Comella in late January you can see how the market reacted to this information. The stock went from triple zero sub penny to near .13 cents, which is a very large move. USRM went on to secure financing and has funding for operations for years to come, it is good to see stocks where this process works with fluidity, more microcap stocks should be looking at employing this White Paper marketing strategy to secure investors.

US Stem Cell Inc (OTCMKTS:USRM)is a Florida corporation and leader in novel regenerative medicine solutions and physician-based stem cell therapies to human and animal patients.Effects of the intradiscal implantation of stromal vascular fraction plus platelet rich plasma in patients with degenerative disc disease was published in the January volume of theJournal of Translational Medicine. The study focused on the implantation of stromal vascular fraction (SVF) in patients suffering from degenerative disc disease. Patients underwent a local tumescent liposuction procedure to remove approximately 60 ml of fat tissue from the abdomen. The fat was separated to isolate the SVF and the cells were delivered directly into the damaged discs. Patients were monitored for a period of 6 months post-treatment, noting considerable decreases in pain and increases in flexion.

Ms. Comellas previous paper, Effects of the intramyocardial implantation of stromal vascular fraction in patients with chronic ischemic cardiomyopathy, was released in theJournal of Translational Medicines June 2016 edition. Using the same procedure, chronic ischemic cardiomyopathy patients were evaluated after SVF injection and able to walk more than 80 additional meters 3 to 6 months after treatment.

Subscribe below and well keep you on top of whats happening before $USRM stock makes its next move.

$USRM 10-Day Chart Below:

U.S. Stem Cell, Inc., is committed to new technological advancements and therapies that give a renewed sense of hope to patients with degenerative diseases. SVF is the latest therapy in a long line of successful treatments the company pioneered. Ms. Comella plans to continue her work with SVF, which has consistently repeated its strong safety profile and success in treating patients.

The second piece of the puzzle was raising capital and the company recently secured a commitment to invest up to $5,000,000 from private equity firm General American Capital Partners LLC (GACP) in exchange for up to 63,873,275 shares of common stock.

We see exponential growth in the stem cell industry, estimated to grow to $170 billion by 2020, said Joseph DaGrosa, Jr., a Principal with General American Capital Partners. We are very pleased to join forces with U.S. Stem Cell, Inc., a leader in regenerative medicine solutions, to help expand our role in this important market.

The 21st Century Cures Act, signed into effect in December of 2016, builds on the FDAs ongoing efforts to advance medical product innovation and ensure that patients get access to treatments as quickly as possible, with continued assurance from high quality evidence that they are safe and effective.

Patient demand for regenerative medicine procedures as a viable alternative to surgery, as well as the transformative capacity of stem cell therapies, are leading the way to increased acceptance by both the medical and regulatory communities, said Mike Tomas, President and CEO of U.S. Stem Cell, Inc.

Few know that as recently as December 2015 these shares were near $2.00 as stem cell was a sector in biotech that had big multiples and a larger hope for the future. U.S. Stem Cell, Inc. (OTCMKTS:USRM) has renewed this hope for many shareholders who have stayed with the stock. Through consolidation and internal organizational changes the company has combined operating divisions (US Stem Cell Training, Vetbiologics, and US Stem Cell Clinic)which include the development of proprietary cell therapy products. They also generate physician and patient based regenerative medicine and cell collection and cell storage services, the sale of cell collection and treatment kits for humans and animals, and the operation of a cell therapy clinic.

The White Papers take the time to explain how the science works, and all this company needed was one yes answer from a larger investor to secure financing to jump start operations and ultimately the stock price. USRM is one of the most exciting stories on the OTC stay tuned we will update the story soon.For more news on $USRM and other fast-moving penny stocks, please subscribe to OracleDispatch.com below.

View original post here:
US Stem Cell Inc (OTCMKTS:USRM) Starting to Open Eyes - The Oracle Dispatch