News & Commentaries

24 Jun 2020

Sleeper Cells: New Neural Stem Cell State Gives Insight Into Cancer

Stembook: Sleeper Cells: New Neural Stem Cell State Gives Insight Into Cancer
ASU researchers discover and explore new resting phase of stem cells that could help put brain tumors to sleep

Phoenix, AZ, USA – The human body contains approximately 200 different kinds of cells, including many kinds of stem cells that have the potential to turn into a variety of specialized cells. Probing into the life cycle states or phases of these cells is important to understanding and treating diseases like dementia and cancer.

24 Jun 2020

ISSCR Urges FDA and EMA to Enforce Regulation of Clinics Offering Unproven and Unapproved Stem Cell-based Interventions

Stembook: ISSCR Urges FDA and EMA to Enforce Regulation of Clinics Offering Unproven and Unapproved Stem Cell-based Interventions
Misleading Marketing Preys on the Hopes of Patients and Families, Including Those with COVID-19

Skokie, IL, USA – In letters released today by the International Society for Stem Cell Research (ISSCR) to the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the European Medicines Agency (EMA), the Society presses for greater enforcement to help protect patients suffering from devastating diseases including COVID-19. The effort comes as the world’s foremost stem cell and regenerative medicine researchers are meeting this week to share the field’s newest discoveries as part of ISSCR 2020 Virtual.

18 Jun 2020

UConn Researcher Invents Nanoparticle for Overcoming Leukemia Treatment Resistance

Stembook: UConn Researcher Invents Nanoparticle for Overcoming Leukemia Treatment Resistance

Mansfield, CT, USA – UConn associate professor of pharmaceutics Xiuling Lu, along with professor of chemistry Rajeswari M. Kasi, was part of a team that recently published a paper in Nature Cell Biology finding a commonly used chemotherapy drug may be repurposed as a treatment for resurgent or chemotherapy-resistant leukemia.

15 Jun 2020

Primitive Stem Cells Point to New Bone Grafts for Stubborn-to-Heal Fractures

Stembook: Primitive Stem Cells Point to New Bone Grafts for Stubborn-to-Heal Fractures

College Station, TX, USA – Although most broken bones can be mended with a firm cast and a generous measure of tender loving care, more complicated fractures require treatments like bone grafting. Researchers at Texas A&M University have now created superior bone grafts using primitive stem cells. They found that these cells help create very fertile scaffolds needed for the bone to regenerate at the site of repair.

11 Jun 2020

Putting ‘Super’ in Natural Killer Cells

Stembook: Putting ‘Super’ in Natural Killer Cells
Deleting an inhibitory gene in natural killer cells derived from induced pluripotent stem cells is found to boost their anti-tumor activity and persistence; researchers now seek to develop a clinical therapy.

San Diego, CA, USA – Using induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) and deleting a key gene, researchers at University of California San Diego School of Medicine have created natural killer cells – a type of immune cell – with measurably stronger activity against a form of leukemia, both in vivo and in vitro.

11 Jun 2020

IU Researchers Model Human Stem Cells to Identify Degeneration in Glaucoma

Stembook: IU Researchers Model Human Stem Cells to Identify Degeneration in Glaucoma

Indianapolis, IN, USA – More than 3 million Americans have glaucoma, a serious eye condition causing vision loss. Using human stem cell models, researchers at Indiana University School of Medicine found they could analyze deficits within cells damaged by glaucoma, with the potential to use this information to develop new strategies to slow the disease process.

8 Jun 2020

Cord Blood as Source for Stem Cell Transplant May Outperform Accepted “Gold Standard” of Matched Sibling Donors

Stembook: Cord Blood as Source for Stem Cell Transplant May Outperform Accepted “Gold Standard” of Matched Sibling Donors

Denver, CO, USA – When a cancer patient needs a bone marrow transplant, there are four common donor sources: A matched related donor (sibling), a matched unrelated donor (from a donor database), a half-matched donor, or umbilical cord blood. Of course, there are plusses and minuses to each approach, but consensus has generally ranked a matched sibling first, followed by a matched unrelated donor, with cord blood and half-matched donors reserved for patients without either of the first two options. Now a University of Colorado Cancer Center study based on a decade of research and treatment may reshuffle this list. In fact, the comparison of 190 patients receiving cord-blood transplants with 123 patients receiving transplants from the “gold standard” of matched sibling donors showed no difference in survival outcomes between these two approaches, with significantly fewer complications due to chronic graft-versus-host disease in patients receiving transplants from cord blood. The study was published in Blood Advances.

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