Ray -

         Please send my congratulations on to Joan. It certainly 
sounds as if she has identified a very promising new approach.
         She is my hero.

Regards,        Bill Isbell
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

At 06:51 PM 7/20/2008, you wrote:
>Joan asked that I post this this for your thoughts and comments:
>
>Ray
>
>I spoke with Dr. Craig Cady several weeks ago and he, for once, 
>sounded a bit disappointed. "Things have been pretty quiet on the 
>stem-cell front," he said. "We seem to be stuck."
>However, when I met him on Friday, July 18th, 2008, he was in fine 
>spirits and an expansive mood.
>"You certainly picked the right day to visit the lab," he said, 
>nearly bursting with excitement or as excited as the serious 
>research ever gets. "We have really had two incredible things happen 
>in our lah and I cannot wait to show you." That very morning they 
>had received an order that they had been expecting for the last 
>several months. It was a container of very rare, very primitive 
>CD-34+ stem cells. These cells cost about $1,000 per milliliter and 
>come bone marrow and then from a company called Stem Cell Technology.
>The more primitive the stem cell the greater chance that it can be 
>changed into another cell-in this case a dopamine producing neuron.
>This morning, Lauren was able to able to make slides and take 
>pictures which meant that she had to isolate the voltage gaited 
>sodium channel which is specific to certain types of neurons. The 
>channels are very well defined and well lit up with the color she 
>uses. There is no comparison with the process they had to work with 
>until now. This is really exciting news they assured me and the 
>excitement was contagious.
>The other major development was the 'matrix' that they had also just 
>received this morning from Georgia Tech and had assembled. A matrix 
>is made up of peptides, proteins and polimars. It is delivered to 
>the brain or the heart (wherever the stem cells are to be injected) 
>and allows the stem cells a strong base on which to attach 
>themselves and to grow. When an injection of stem cells is 
>introduced to dishes of cells now, nearly 70% are lost because they 
>don't have anything on which to adhere.
>Before I left, I was given the opportunity to watch Lauren make up 
>plates (under the hood that keeps out contamination of the new CD34+ 
>cells and to look at them under a microscope. They were unlike any 
>other stem cells that I have ever seen and unlike any seen by the 
>scientists in the lab. They were in 3 dimensions and it was really 
>great to see them suspended in the solution, bouncing ever so 
>slightly. I really think that Dr. Cady is onto something big here!
>
>
>
>
>Rayilyn Brown
>Director AZNPF
>Arizona Chapter National Parkinson Foundation
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Bill Isbell
Santa Barbara , California  

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