Lekha Varun - Why they chose to preserve their baby #39;s stem cells
Lekha Varun, young parents from Chennai talk about why they thought it was important to preserve their baby #39;s stem cells. For further information on stem c...

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Lekha & Varun - Why they chose to preserve their baby's stem cells - Video

March 14, 2014

Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com Your Universe Online

Japanese scientists who in January announced they developed a new method to create stem cells using blood cells and acid are considering retracting their study.

Scientists from the RIKEN Center for Developmental Biology in Kobe, Japan announced earlier this year that they had discovered that dipping blood cells into acid could turn them into stem cells. This study was considered ground-breaking research in the field, but now the scientists are not so sure of their findings.

The team initially discovered the method in mice, finding that by simply exposing blood cells to acidic liquids, they would turn into stimulus-triggered acquisition of pluripotency cells (STAP cells). They found that white blood cells in newborn mice were returned to a versatile state through the simple process. Creating stem cells in a lab this way would help grow cells to replenish organs damaged by disease or accident.

However, after the announcement of this discovery scientists from all over the world criticized the research because they could not repeat the method to create these cells. Other critics said photographs and sentences in the report were identical to those used in earlier theses.

RIKEN said it is establishing a third-party panel to investigate the content of the report and is planning to withdraw the claim about the achievement.

We are making considerations including the option of recommending that the paper be retracted, Ryoji Noyori, who jointly won the Nobel Prize for chemistry in 2001, told a press briefing in Tokyo, according to AFP.

On Friday, Japanese media reported that Haruko Obokata, who published the findings in January, agreed that the research should be pulled back. A joint statement signed by the group of researchers from RIKEN, including Obokata, said the three were considering a possible retraction.

The credibility of the papers have been brought into question, and from the perspective of research ethics, RIKEN is considering the possibility of retracting the two papers published in Nature, the statement said.

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Controversy Around Stem Cell Discovery May Lead To Retraction

AFP Japan institute admits it may retract 'game-changing' cell study

Tokyo (AFP) - A Japanese research institute said Friday that a study which promised a revolutionary way to create stem cells should be quashed after claims its data was faulty, dealing a huge blow to what was touted as a game-changing discovery.

Riken institute head, Ryoji Noyori, who jointly won the Nobel Prize for chemistry in 2001, also heaped criticism on lead researcher Haruko Obokata for her "sloppiness" and warned the controversy could shake the public's faith in research.

The findings, published by 30-year-old Obokata along with other Japanese researchers and a US-based scientist in the January edition of British journal "Nature", outlined a relatively simple way to grow transplant tissue in the lab.

But it faced hard questions as the respected institute, which sponsored the study, launched an inquiry last month over the credibility of its data used in the explosive findings.

Among key concerns was that researchers used erroneous images -- crucial to supporting the study -- which resembled those used in Obokata's doctoral dissertation in 2011.

"I apologise that the papers which Riken researchers recently announced in Nature caused an incident that could hurt the credibility of the scientific community," Noyori told a press briefing.

"This immature researcher handled and collected enormous amounts of research data, and handled it with sloppiness... This must never happen."

Riken did not offer an opinion on whether the results of the study were valid, citing a continuing probe. But the institute itself cannot unilaterally retract the paper.

"I have judged that what is most important was for the paper to be swiftly retracted and to conduct the research again. I have suggested that to the authors," said Masatoshi Takeichi, director of Riken's Centre for Developmental Biology.

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Japan institute admits it may retract 'game-changing' cell study

Combining nanodrug-based chemotherapy and cryoablation provides an effective strategy to eliminate cancer stem-like cells (CSCs) -- the root of cancer resistance and metastasis, which will help to improve the safety and efficacy of treating malignancies that are refractory to conventional therapies.

Cryoablation (also called cryosurgery or cryotherapy) is an energy-based, minimally invasive surgical technique that has been investigated to treat a variety of diseases including cancer, which is done by freezing the diseased tissue to subzero temperature to induce irreversible damage. It is particularly attractive for fighting against breast cancer due to its excellent cosmetic outcome to preserve the organ with unnoticeable scar formation on skin. However, cryoablation alone has limited effectiveness on eradicating cancer stem-like cells (CSCs), which may lead to cancer recurrence and/or metastasis post operation. A team of researchers from the Department of Biomedical Engineering and Comprehensive Cancer Center at The Ohio State University introduced an innovative strategy by combining cryoablation with nanoparticle-medicated chemotherapy and demonstrated that the combined therapy can significantly augment the destruction of CSCs, resulting in eliminating nearly all CSCs. This technology provides a new approach to overcome drug resistance of CSCs and improve the safety and efficacy of cancer cryoablation.

"This novel combined therapy of cryoablation and nanodrug is a significant step forward in improving the safety and efficacy of fighting against cancer. Our study provides the first account of minimizing cancer recurrence by destroying the cancer stem-like cells in the field of cryoablation for cancer treatment." said Xiaoming He, Ph.D., of The Ohio State University and senior author of this paper. "It is valuable to facilitate the clinical applications of cryoablation by eliminating the root of cancer resistance -- the cancer stem-like cells."

"The nanoparticles used in this study were optimized for effective drug delivery." said Wei Rao, Ph.D., the lead author of the paper. According to the researchers, an optimized size of the nanodrug facilitates its uptake by cancer cells via endocytosis. A positively charged nanodrug has high electrostatic affinity to the negatively charged cell plasma membrane, which should further facilitate its uptake by cancer cells. Moreover, materials on the nanoparticles have high affinity to CD44 that is one of the common protein complexes overexpressed on cancer stem-like cells. Therefore, the use of nanodrug can help to achieve much-enhanced bioavailability of anticancer drug to cancer stem-like cells compared to conventional chemotherapy using free drug. This particularly attractive feature meets the demand of targeted delivery and therapy and could minimize the drug systemic toxicity. Its combination with cryoablation can significantly augment cryoinjury to ensure complete destruction of all cancer stem-like cells.

Currently, research on the combined therapy of cryoablation and nanodrug showed promising results using 3D mammosphere model at the microscale. Future research will focus more on in vivo studies to monitor tumor relapse after the combined treatment and further translate this technology into the clinic. Although more research is required to ascertain its safety and efficacy, this study provides a novel strategy of combining cryoablation and nanodrug that demonstrates great potential to eliminate cancer from its root -- the cancer stem-like cells.

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The above story is based on materials provided by World Scientific. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.

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Cancer stem cells destroyed with cryoablation and nanoparticle-encapsulated anticancer drug