Regenerative Medicine and Stem Cells Technologies

Researchers at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA; CA, USA) have developed brain organoids that exhibit neurological patterns similar to those found in living human brains.

A team of researchers has developed the first human "mini-hearts" in the lab to have clearly beating chambers. The miniature organs, or organoids, are no bigger than sesame seeds and were generated by self-assembly using pluripotent stem cells, according to Science Magazine.

By expressing Yamanaka proteins in human cells, researchers have turned back the biological clock. Researchers from Stanford University (CA, USA) have reverted cells back to a younger state by transiently expressing the well-known Yamanaka factors.

Pennsylvania State University scientists have discovered a combination of four molecules, which modulate four signaling pathways, that converts astrocytes into functional neurons.

Researchers at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) have developed a gene therapy vector for blood disorders like sickle cell disease and beta-thalassemia that is potentially safer and more effective than those currently used in gene therapy trials for those conditions.

In a new Phase I clinical trial, scientists from the University of Western Australia (Perth, Australia) have demonstrated that a novel mesenchymal stromal cell (MSC) therapy can regulate inflammation in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD).

Moderna will start trialling its experimental mRNA-based HIV vaccine as early as tomorrow (19 August), according to a new submission to the US National Institutes of Health Clinical Trial registry.