Cloning And Stem Cell News, Research and Resources - July 2009 Archives

Stem cell research: From molecular physiology to therapeutic applications (7/31/2009)

Stem cell research promises remedies to many devastating diseases that are currently incurable, ranging from diabetes and Parkinson's disease to paralysis. Totipotent embryonic stem cells have great potential for generating a wide range of different human cells that can be used to restore malfunctioning or damaged cells and tissues in patients. ...> Full Article

Male germ cells can be directly converted into other cell types (7/30/2009)

Researchers have found a way to directly convert spermatogonial stem cells, the precursors of sperm cells, into tissues of the prostate, skin and uterus. ...> Full Article

Placenta-derived stem cells may help sufferers of lung diseases (7/29/2009)

Human placenta-derived stem cells, known to engraft in solid organs, including the lungs, also demonstrate characteristics of high plasticity and low immunogenicity. When transplanted into laboratory animals with bleomycin-induced lung fibrosis, fetal membrane cells were found to decrease lung fibrosis. Such transplantation may ultimately play a role in the treatment of lung diseases, such as pulmonary fibrosis and fibrotic diseases caused by tuberculosis, chemical exposure, radiation or pathogens. No known therapy reverses pulmonary fibrosis. ...> Full Article

Scientists closer to making implantable bone material, thanks to new research (7/28/2009)

Scientists are closer to understanding how to grow replacement bones with stem cell technology, thanks to research published today in the journal Nature Materials ...> Full Article

Neuronal survival and axonal regrowth obtained in vitro (7/27/2009)

While repair of the central nervous system has long been considered impossible, French researchers from Inserm, the CNRS and the UPMC have just developed a strategy that could promote neuronal regeneration after injury. The in vitro studies have just been published in the journal PLoS ONE. ...> Full Article

Stem cells not the only way to fix a broken heart (7/27/2009)

Researchers appear to have a new way to fix a broken heart. They have devised a method to coax heart muscle cells into reentering the cell cycle, allowing the differentiated adult cells to divide and regenerate healthy heart tissue after a heart attack, according to studies in mice and rats reported in the July 24 issue of the journal Cell, a Cell Press publication. ...> Full Article

International research team seeks to unravel flatworm regeneration (7/27/2009)

Planarian flatworms are only a few millimeters up to a few centimeters in length, live in freshwater and are the object of intense research, because they possess the ability to regenerate lost tissue with the help of their stem cells and even grow an entirely new worm out of minute amputated body parts. Researchers in Germany, the US and Canada have identified small RNAs which may play a role in regeneration and stem cell function. ...> Full Article

Reprogrammed mouse fibroblasts can make a whole mouse (7/26/2009)

In a paper publishing online July 23 in Cell Stem Cell, a Cell Press journal, Dr. Shaorong Gao and colleagues from the National Institute of Biological Sciences in Beijing, China, report an important advance in the characterization of reprogrammed induced pluripotent stem cells, or iPSCs. ...> Full Article

Skin-like tissue developed from human embryonic stem cells (7/25/2009)

Tufts researchers have used pluripotent human embryonic stem cells to create three-dimensional tissues that mimic human skin and the oral mucosa. ...> Full Article

Bone from blood: Circulating cells form bone outside the normal skeleton, study finds (7/24/2009)

The accepted dogma has been that bone-forming cells, derived from the body's connective tissue, are the only cells able to form the skeleton. However, new research shows that specialized cells in the blood share a common origin with white blood cells derived from the bone marrow and that these bloodstream cells are capable of forming bone at sites distant from the original skeleton. This work represents the first example of how circulating cells may contribute to abnormal bone formation. ...> Full Article

Students embed stem cells in sutures to enhance healing (7/24/2009)

Biomedical engineering students have demonstrated a practical way to embed a patient's adult stem cells in the surgical thread used to repair serious orthopedic injuries such as ruptured tendons. The goal is to enhance healing and reduce the likelihood of reinjury. ...> Full Article

Researchers look to imprinted genes for clues to fetal growth restriction in cloned swine (7/23/2009)

Researchers at North Carolina State University have found that intrauterine growth restriction (IUGR), which results in low birth weight and long-term deleterious health effects in cloned swine, is linked to a type of gene -- known as an imprinted gene -- found only in placental mammals. ...> Full Article

Johns Hopkins Medicine co-sponsors 2009 World Stem Cell Summit (7/22/2009)

Johns Hopkins Medicine is co-sponsoring the 2009 World Stem Cell Summit to be held in Baltimore this September. ...> Full Article

Neural stem cells offer potential treatment for Alzheimer's disease (7/22/2009)

UC Irvine scientists have shown for the first time that neural stem cells can rescue memory in mice with advanced Alzheimer's disease, raising hopes of a potential treatment for the leading cause of elderly dementia that afflicts 5.3 million people in the US. ...> Full Article

Induced pluripotent stem cells repair heart, study shows (7/21/2009)

In a proof-of-concept study, Mayo Clinic investigators have demonstrated that induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells can be used to treat heart disease. iPS cells are stem cells converted from adult cells. ...> Full Article

Medical use for waste television screens (7/14/2009)

Researchers have found a way of recovering polyvinyl-alcohol from LCD television screens and transforming it into a substance suitable for use in tissue scaffolds which help parts of the body regenerate. It can also be used in pills and dressings that are designed to deliver drugs to particular parts of the body. ...> Full Article

Research may hold key to maintaining embryonic stem cells in lab (7/12/2009)

In a new study that could transform embryonic stem cell (ES cell) research, scientists at UT Southwestern Medical Center have discovered why mouse ES cells can be easily grown in a laboratory while other mammalian ES cells are difficult, if not impossible, to maintain. ...> Full Article

Study identifies potential fix for damaged knees (7/11/2009)

Investigators from Hospital for Special Surgery have shown that a biodegradable scaffold or plug can be used to treat patients with damaged knee cartilage. The study is unique in that it used serial magnetic resonance imaging and newer quantitative T2 mapping to examine how the plug incorporated itself into the knee. The research will be presented during the annual meeting of the American Orthopedic Society for Sports Medicine. ...> Full Article

Stem cells' 'suspended' state preserved by key step, scientists report (7/10/2009)

UCSF scientists have identified a gene that is essential for embryonic stem cells to maintain their all-purpose, pluripotent state. Exploiting the finding may lead to a greater understanding of how cells acquire their specialized states and provide a strategy to efficiently reprogram mature cells back into the pluripotent state, an elusive step in stem cell research but one crucial to a range of potential clinical treatments. ...> Full Article

Human sperm created from embryonic stem cells (7/9/2009)

Researchers at Newcastle University have created human sperm from embryonic stem cells. ...> Full Article

First cGMP feeder-independent pluripotent stem cell banks released for distribution (7/8/2009)

The WiCell Research Institute and the Waisman Clinical Biomanufacturing Facility announced July 6 the release of the first current Good Manufacturing Practices feeder-independent pluripotent stem cell banks available for sale and distribution to researchers worldwide. ...> Full Article

Bioethicists lead call for public debates on future uses of stem cells (7/7/2009)

Science is running ahead of public debate and guidelines to grapple with use of stem cell-derived eggs and sperm ...> Full Article

Scientists find molecular differences between embryonic stem cells and reprogrammed skin cells (7/6/2009)

UCLA researchers have found that embryonic stem cells and skin cells reprogrammed into embryonic-like cells have inherent molecular differences, demonstrating for the first time that the two cell types are clearly distinguishable from one another. ...> Full Article

Scientists identify genetic factors that hold promise for treatment of vascular diseases (7/6/2009)

Researchers at the Gladstone Institute of Cardiovascular Disease have discovered a key switch that makes stem cells turn into the type of muscle cells that reside in the wall of blood vessels. The same switch might be used in the future to limit growth of vascular muscle cells that cause narrowing of arteries leading to heart attacks and strokes, limit formation of blood vessels that feed cancers or make new blood vessels for organs that are not getting enough blood flow. ...> Full Article

Salamanders, regenerative wonders, heal like mammals, people (7/5/2009)

The salamander is a superhero of regeneration, able to replace lost limbs, damaged lungs, sliced spinal cord -- even bits of lopped-off brain. ...> Full Article

Blood stem cell growth factor reverses memory decline in mice (7/4/2009)

A human growth factor that stimulates blood stem cells to proliferate in bone marrow reverses memory impairment in mice genetically altered to develop Alzheimer's disease, a new study finds. ...> Full Article

Team's advanced nerve cell system could help cure diabetic neuropathy, related diseases (7/3/2009)

University of Central Florida researchers have created the first lab-grown motor nerves that are insulated and organized the same way they are in the body. The group's model system could dramatically improve understanding of the causes of myelin-related conditions such as multiple sclerosis, diabetic neuropathy and Guillian-Barré syndrome, potentially enabling the discovery and testing of new drug therapies. ...> Full Article

Cell transplantation and cardiac repair (7/3/2009)

Two separate studies published in the current issue of Cell Transplantation into cardiac repair by cell transplantation have found, respectively, that the best way to deliver autologous bone-marrow mononuclear cells to the heart following a myocardial infarction was via the anterograde intracoronary vein and that bone marrow cell transplants for limb ischemia induced angiogenesis in patients failing therapy and facing amputation. The first study found higher cell retention; the second demonstrated an alternative to amputation. ...> Full Article

New clue into how brain stem cells develop into cells which repair damaged tissue (7/2/2009)

Insight could lead to new therapies to repair damage caused by MS ...> Full Article

Neural stem cell differentiation factor discovered (7/1/2009)

Neural stem cells represent the cellular backup of our brain. These cells are capable of self-renewal to form new stem cells or differentiate into neurons, astrocytes or oligodendrocytes. The receptors of the Notch family play a significant role in this process. So far, only stimulating extracellular ligands of Notch receptors had been described. Biochemists of Goethe University Medical School now describe a long time assumed but not yet identified soluble Notch inhibitor. ...> Full Article