Regenerative Medicine and Stem Cells Technologies

The FDA has given its fast track designation to the investigational cell therapy IDCT for the treatment of degenerative disc disease.

A research team at the University of California, Riverside, has found that electronic cigarettes, often targeted to youth and pregnant women, produce a stress response in neural stem cells, which are critical cells in the brain.

Due to the increasing insulin resistance of cells, patients with type 2 diabetes suffer from increased blood sugar levels with far-reaching consequences. After many years of illness, insulin production dries up and patients have to inject insulin.

Researchers from Aarhus University and Aarhus University Hospital have succeeded in using mice with a transplanted human immune system to study functions in the immune system which are otherwise particularly difficult to study. The method could turn out to be important in further research into cancer, HIV and autoimmune diseases.

During mammalian brain development, neural precursor cells first generate neurons and later astrocytes. This cell fate change is a key process generating proper numbers of neurons and astrocytes. Here we discovered that FGF regulates the cell fate switch from neurons to astrocytes in the developing cerebral cortex using mice. FGF is a critical extracellular regulator of the cell fate switch, necessary and sufficient, in the mammalian cerebral cortex.

Although largely paralyzed, ALS patients can communicate through eye-tracking devices because they retain eye movement until the diseases late stages. Yet, how some motor neurons resist ALS to allow for this movement has been a mystery.

A sheet of iPSC-derived epithelial cells has been transplanted into a patient for the first time by a team from Osaka University (Japan), led by Koji Nishida.

Thirdhand smoke can damage epithelial cells in the respiratory system by stressing cells and causing them to fight for survival, a research team led by scientists at the University of California, Riverside, has found. The finding could assist physicians treating patients exposed to thirdhand smoke.

According to a press release from the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM), the Institute’s governing body has approved a grant of nearly $12 million to University of California, San Diego researcher Dr. Stephanie Cherqui.

Cancer cell plasticity facilitates the development of therapy resistance and malignant progression. De-differentiation processes, such as an epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT), are known to enhance cellular plasticity.