Across America and around the world, scientists are developing new ways to
use embryonic stem cells to fight chronic disease and disability.
One widely-publicized advance is the development of "imitation" embryonic
stem cells, the new Thomson/Yamanaka reprogrammed skin cells. But even if
these new cells are proven completely successful, (which may take 10-15
years) that will not be the end of the struggle. We still need to know how
to use the embryonic stem cells (from whatever source) and fulfill the motto
of the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine: "Turning stem cells
into cures".
Fortunately, the world is not waiting. Here are highlights of just a few
recent advances. For more complete information, visit the excellent website,
www.sciencedaily.com, which has clear descriptions of the experiments, and
citations for the source papers.
1. NO DEAF CHICKENS: Hearing depends on tiny hairs in the inner ear, which
send sound vibrations to the brain. In people, these hearing cells cannot be
replaced by the body; when they wear out, we cannot hear. Chickens and other
birds, however, can regenerate them. Dr. Stefan Heller of Stanford
University has directed embryonic stem cells into human hair cells in a
Petri dish, bringing us closer to a cure for deafness.
2. STEM CELLS AGAINST TERROR: Steve Stice, of the University of Georgia, may
have found a way to use human embryonic stem cells to detect the presence of
poison gas in the air. Combining a computer, graph charts and a box full of
stem cells, the animal science professor is working with the U.S. Naval
Research Laboratory to develop an early warning system that could save lives
in the event of a terrorist attack.
3. NOBEL PRIZE GOES TO ESC RESEARCHERS: Three research heroes, Mario R.
Capecchi, Martin J. Evans, and Oliver Smithies received the world's highest
honor in 2007, for discovering "principles for introducing specific gene
modifications in mice by the use of embryonic stem cells." The hard work of
these men's lives has changed medicine forever. Because of their efforts,
more than 500 mouse models of disease have been developed. When you hear the
phrase, "knockout mice" that does not mean boxing rodents, but rather mice
which have one or more genes knocked out of their cellular makeup, so
science can learn which gene brings cure, and which brings trouble.
Political winds of favor may not have allowed these great scientists to
receive the recognition they deserve, but the world is the richer for their
having lived, and worked, and triumphed.
4. CHEAP STEM CELL SORTER: A replacement may have been found for the highly
expensive Fluorescent Activated Cell Sorters. Like the old saying about
yachts, FACS are so expensive, if you have to ask how much one costs, you
can't afford it. But UC Ed Monuki at UC Irvine has developed a cheap and
tiny stem cell sorter about the size of a dime. The new device works by
measuring the electrical current the stem cells give off, and magnetically
separating them, -and it may cost just pennies apiece!
5. T-CELLS FROM E-CELLS: New Hope for Fighting AIDS. When HIV-AIDS strikes,
it targets a blood-forming cell called a T-cell, part of the body's immune
system. When the immune system stops working, a common cold can kill. But
at UCLA and the Institute for Stem Cell Biology and Medicine, scientists
like Zoran Galic and Jerome Zack are culturing human embryonic stem cells,
raising them on mouse bone marrow support cells-then injecting them into a
human thymus gland implanted in a mouse-and then those cells became new
blood T-cells. The answer to AIDS may come from a mouse, a drop of blood,
and an embryonic stem cell.
6. MY ACHEY BREAKY HEART: Stem cells can't help when romance goes wrong-but
what about re-growing cardiac muscles after a heart attack? At the
University of Washington, Dr. Chuck Murry is attempting to do just that-and
with laboratory rats, he is succeeding. Using human ESCs and a cocktail of
growth-encouraging proteins, Murry was able to improve function in 100% of
his test rats' damaged hearts.
7. RHYTHMS IN THE HEART: Imagine an orchestra, where every musician has
played together for years-and suddenly a 12-year-old joins in. Their rhythm
would be upset. But if the kid had the orchestra's recordings, and practiced
with those for a while, he or she could fit in more smoothly. Similarly, if
stem cell transplants are put into a damaged heart, they must fit in with
the rhythms of the older cells, or cause a cardiac problem called
arrhythmia. Led by Dr. Nadire Ali, scientists at Imperial College, London,
are work to construct a stem cell patch for a damaged heart. To prevent
arrhythmia, they allow the new heart stem cells to "practice" in a lab dish
for 4-6 months.
8. "BAD" STEM CELLS MAY BLOCK CANCER CURES: radiation or chemotherapy may
shrink tumors in breast or prostate cancer, seemingly bringing improvement.
But the cancer may come back again, worse than before. Cancer cells,
attacked by the radiation, may be adapting to it, changing, in a manner much
like embryonic stem cells. Maryland scientist Dr. Vasyl Vasko is studying
how these cancer stem cells work, to defeat them.
9. MONKEY BUSINESS? . Oregon scientists like Shoukhrat Mitalipov have made a
line of stem cells from rhesus monkeys, a species close to man. Using a
process called Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer, or SCNT, the scientists put a
monkey skin cell into a monkey egg cell, and let it develop into the stem
cell stage. Their aim is to develop stem cells for cures which would not be
rejected by a patient's body. They credit their success to a new method of
nucleus removal called Oosight Spindle Imaging System, which apparently did
little or no damage to the egg cell during the process.
10. WHY COW EGGS ARE IMPORTANT: With human eggs difficult to obtain, it may
be possible to study the process of making and using embryonic stem cell
lines by using microscopic cow eggs, cheap and easily obtained. If a cow egg
had its nucleus removed, so that its genetic information, or "cow-ness", is
mostly gone, it could function as a nurturing shelter. A human skin cell
could be placed inside the "shell" of the egg, to study the development of
the stem cells. This would never be used for human cures, due to the mix of
human and animal cells, but it could be tremendously important in learning
how to make the cells which bring hope to all humanity. Hats off to UK
researchers like Dr. Lyle Armstrong at Newcastle University and Kings
College London!
11. ADULT STEM CELLS NOT FLEXIBLE ENOUGH FOR BRAIN WORK: Part of science is
learning what does not work. Contrary to the hopes of adult stem cell
research supporters, these stem cells may not be adaptable enough for
"as-is" transplantation in the brain. Previously, some thought that adult
stem cells could simply be plugged into damaged areas of the brain, and they
would automatically become whatever was needed. Unfortunately, adult cells
from one part of the brain may not fit everywhere. "A stem cell that
produces neurons that could be useful. in the cerebral cortex.will be most
likely useless. in the spinal cord," said Dr. Carlos E. Lois, of MIT's
Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences.
12. "SMART" MOLECULE HELPS CONTROL STEM CELLS: A molecule named IQ-1 may
have the "smarts" required to manage embryonic stem cells. At the Keck
School of Medicine, USC, Michael Kahn, Ph.D, worked with a molecule called
IQ-1, and found that it stabilized the multiplication of embryonic cells as
they divided. The cells increased their numbers cleanly, reliably, instead
of becoming something undesirable.
13. DISSOLVING A SCAR.Although part of the body's natural healing process, a
scar in the wrong place can be a problem itself. At Schepens Eye Research
Institute, Dr. Michael Young's team has used a molecule (MMP-2, induced by
stem cells) to dissolve scars on the surface of the eye of a mouse. This
allowed transplantation of a working retina. Dissolving a scar may also help
fight spinal cord injury paralysis, Alzheimer's Disease, Parkinsons' and
other nerve-related conditions.
14. REVERSING CANCER? Embryonic stem cells and cancer cells multiply
amazingly fast. What do they have in common that allows this speed? At
Northwestern University, Dr. Mary J.C. Hendrix found that both cells
secreted a protein called Nodal. Astonishingly, when the level of Nodal was
turned down, the cancer cells reverted to a harmless state. The study of
embryonic stem cells may lead to a cure for cancer.
15. JAMES BOND AND STEM CELLS: The fictional secret agent's recipe for a
martini ("Shaken, not stirred") may be a help with one of the most important
problems of stem cell therapies: the need for large quantities of cells,
properly spaced. (Cells that jumble together may multiply improperly.) At
Georgia Tech, Rich Carpenedo, a graduate student, noticed that a lab dish of
embryonic stem cells left on a machine called a "sample shaker" had an
unexpectedly positive result-there were lots more stem cells, spaced apart
in a useful, predictable manner. The shaking technique may be important!
16. COUPLES WILLING TO DONATE UNUSED BLASTOCYSTS: It was once thought that
almost no couples involved in In-Vitro Fertility procedures would be
willing to donate their left over blastocysts to stem cell research. A new
study from Duke University and Johns Hopkins shows just the opposite. At the
Berman Institute of Bioethics, Dr. Ruth Faden and Anne Lyerly found that a
large majority (60 percent) of infertility patients would prefer to help the
new research, rather than discarding, storing, or giving their unused
blastocysts to other couples (22% preferred this option).
17. MODELING MONSTERS: ISOLATING LOU GEHRIG'S DISEASE: In the terrible
disease ALS (Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, better known as Lou Gehrig's
disease), motor nerves break down. But do the nerves fail because of a
problem inside the cells or outside them? Scientists Kevin Eggan of the
Harvard Stem Cell Institute and Serge Przedborski of Columbia University
Medical Center, used embryonic stem cells to make a microscopic model of
ALS, to learn how the disease develops, and which drugs may be useful to
defeat it. Using their own new model, these champion scientists saw that a
non-nerve cell called an astrocyte may be a poisonous part of the problem.
18. MUSCULAR DYSTROPHY TAKES A HIT: Called incurable, muscular dystrophy
wastes away the body's muscles, a slow but inexorable crippling. But at the
University of Texas, Dr. Rita Perlingeira's research team used ESC research
to make formerly wasted muscles function. A gene (PAX 3) found in embryonic
stem cells was injected into the lab rats non-functioning leg muscles-which
began to work again.
19. NEW KNEES FOR OLD: Athletes and non-athletes alike suffer when their
knees wear out. The body cannot re-grow the cartilage cushion in the joints.
At Rice University, however, researcher Kyriacos A. Athanasiou has developed
a new method to make cartilage-like cells from human embryonic stem cells.
20. SOCKS OR A T-SHIRT--ALL STEM CELL LINES NOT THE SAME: The Bush
Administration's restrictions limit federal funding to 78 lines, of which
only about 20 are actually useful and available. If embryonic stem cell
lines were identical, this miniscule number might be enough. However, UCLA
biologist Yi Sun and Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator Thomas
Sudhof of the University of Texas compared just two of the
Presidentially-approved lines, and found them different in important ways.
Cells derived from one line tended to fit one side of the brain, while a
second line worked best on the other side. This difference is important:
like reaching in the sock drawer and getting a T-shirt instead. Many stem
cell lines are needed, so investigators can find exactly what is needed.
21. HEALING A FRACTURED SKULL: What if there was a way for even terribly
broken skulls to grow back together? Johns Hopkins scientists Nathaniel S.
Hwang, Jennifer Elisseeff and others have developed a new way to grow bone.
Taking cells isolated from embryonic stem cells, the investigators let them
grow on a framework, or scaffold, itself made of living materials, which
would dissolve when no longer needed.
22. SEAWEED FOR STEM CELLS? At Australia's University of New South Wales,
seaweed (algae) may prove useful for both the new IPS (skin reprogramming)
and original embryonic stem cell techniques. Micro-encapsulating the stem
cells in a sort of seaweed wrap, the scientists hope to prevent the growth
of tumors, while still allowing the stem cells to differentiate and function
properly. Led by UNSW Professor Bernie Tuch of the Diabetes Transplant Unit,
both mouse and human embryonic stem cells were used, the latter provided by
Dr. Kuldip Sidhu. (The micro-encapsulation process was previously used in a
non-embryonic project, the Seaweed Diabetes Pilot Trial, transplanting
insulin-producing cells from donor humans to insulin-needing people, a human
trial currently underway.)
23. NEW CELLS FOR BREATH: Anyone who has ever struggled to breathe has a
hint of the agony of cystic fibrosis, (CF) the choking lung disease. Thanks
to the pioneering work of men and women like Rick Wetsel, Eva Zsigmond, and
C. Thomas Caskey, CF may be on the way out. At the University of Texas,
these scientists have used ESCs to create a transplantable source of new and
healthy breathing cells.
24. PATIENT-SPECIFIC CELL LINES SOUGHT: UC Irvine scientist Dr. Hans
Keirstead is working on a huge problem with transplanting organs (like a
liver, for example), which the body may reject it as foreign-and the patient
dies. But if the replacement organ was grown from the patient's own cells,
it might be fully accepted, and function, and save the patient's life. With
the assistance of Gabriel Nistor, who designed their new work station at the
Sue and Bill Gross Stem Cell Research Center at UCI, Dr. Keirstead is
working with highly purified embryonic stem cells, lasers, robotic
instruments (for cell manipulation), and Somatic Nuclear Cell Transfer
techniques to find new ways to help the body grow its own cure.
Onward and upward!
Don Reed
www.stemcellbattles.com
Don C. Reed is co-chair of Californians for Cures, and writes for their web
blog, www.stemcellbattles.com. Reed was citizen-sponsor for California's
Roman Reed Spinal Cord Injury Research Act of 1999, named after his
paralyzed son; he worked as a grassroots advocate for California's Senator
Deborah Ortiz's three stem cell regulatory laws, served as an executive
board member for Proposition 71, the California Stem Cells for Research and
Cures Act, and is director of policy outreach for Americans for Cures. The
retired schoolteacher is the author of five books and thirty magazine
articles, and has received the National Press Award.
Rayilyn Brown
Board Member AZNPF
Arizona Chapter National Parkinson's Foundation
[log in to unmask]
----------------------------------------------------------------------
To sign-off Parkinsn send a message to: mailto:[log in to unmask]
In the body of the message put: signoff parkinsn
