Stem Cells News and Research

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Stem cells have the remarkable potential to develop into many different cell types in the body during early life and growth. In addition, in many tissues they serve as a sort of internal repair system, dividing essentially without limit to replenish other cells as long as the person or animal is still alive. When a stem cell divides, each new cell has the potential either to remain a stem cell or become another type of cell with a more specialized function, such as a muscle cell, a red blood cell, or a brain cell.

Hyperbaric oxygen treatments mobilizes stem cells aiding injury repair

According to a study to be published in the American Journal of Physiology-Heart and Circulation Physiology, a typical course of hyperbaric oxygen treatments increases by eight-fold the number of stem cells circulating in a patient's body.

29 Dec 2005

Scientists discover how to integrate new neurons into the brain

In experiments with mice, scientists from Johns Hopkins' Institute for Cell Engineering have discovered the steps required to integrate new neurons into the brain's existing operations.

22 Dec 2005

Plant stem cell breakthrough made

Totipotent stem cells allow plants to build new organs throughout their whole life. But it has been unclear how hormones and genetic factors work together to prevent plants from having growth that is either stunted, or uncontrolled and tumor-like. Scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Developmental Biology have now uncovered a feedback mechanism, involving a growth-enhancing hormone and a regulatory protein, which controls the number of stem cells the plant produces.

22 Dec 2005

Light at the end of the tunnel for arthritis sufferers

There is at last a light at the end of the tunnel for Arthritis sufferers.

21 Dec 2005

Stem cells provide new way to sneak drugs into brain

One of the great challenges for treating Parkinson's diseases and other neurodegenerative disorders is getting medicine to the right place in the brain.

15 Dec 2005

Researchers discover potential mechanism for tumor growth

Researchers at Columbia University Medical Center have identified an inherent feature of stem and progenitor cells that may promote initiation and progression of cancerous tumors.

15 Dec 2005

Remarkable developmental pathway in frog embryos discovered

Howard Hughes Medical Institute researchers have discovered an important regulatory pathway that enables frog embryos to develop normally even after being split in half -- as happens in the development of identical twins.

15 Dec 2005

Protein induces dental pulp stem cells into dentin-forming odontoblasts

When dentists examine patients with a damaged tooth that has become infected and abscessed, or filled with tissue-eroding fluid, they typically have two options: Root canal or extraction.

15 Dec 2005

Eye cell implants improve lives of Parkinson's sufferers

U.S. researchers say that people with Parkinson's disease showed a marked improvement after surgeons implanted in their brains chemical-producing cells taken from the eye of a dead donor.

14 Dec 2005

$Bone quality regulator identified - possible target for preventing and treating bone fractures$

Bone quality regulator identified - possible target for preventing and treating bone fractures

University of California - San Francisco (UCSF) scientists have determined that the quality of bone matrix, a key component of bone, is regulated by a molecule known as transforming growth factor beta.

13 Dec 2005

AMN107 drug shows promise in leukemia resistance to Gleevec

The targeted agent AMN107 can produce dramatic benefits in patients with some forms of leukemia that are resistant to Gleevec, the standard therapy for these cancers, say researchers at The University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center.

13 Dec 2005

SPARC promotes heart muscle formation from stem cells

The protein SPARC plays a key role in the development of heart muscle in the embryo. An Austrian Science Fund FWF project has discovered this previously unknown role of SPARC.

12 Dec 2005

Stem cells may cause some forms of bone cancer

The researchers are the first to identify a population of cells with characteristics of adult and embryonic stem cells in cultures derived from biopsies of patients' bone tumors. They describe their findings in the medical journal Neoplasia.

7 Dec 2005

Mesoblast recruits first patients for pilot clinical trials

Australia's adult stem cell company, Mesoblast Limited, today announced that several patients have now been formally recruited for its Pilot Clinical Trials.

6 Dec 2005

Fibroblast research could lead to alternatives to implanted electronic pacemakers

In guinea pig experiments, Johns Hopkins scientists fused common connective tissue cells taken from lungs with heart muscle cells to create a safe and effective biological pacemaker whose cells can fire on their own and naturally regulate the muscle's rhythmic beat.

5 Dec 2005