During pregnancy, you'll need to decide what you want to do with your baby's cord blood. So what exactly is cord blood?

Source insciences.org Image of Jeff Davies, MD, PhD, and Eva Guinan, MD (Image from insciences.org)

A new technique being tested in stem-cell transplants from imperfectly matched donors has revealed a striking, unforeseen response that can suppress graft-versus-host disease, a common and dangerous complication of mismatched transplants, report scientists from Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.

Laura Dominguez was only 16 years old when she suffered a spinal cord injury in a car accident that left her a paraplegic. Now she is starting to walk again with the help of Adult Stem Cells taken from her own body.

Stem Cells at a Glance

What are the differences between embryonic, adult and induced pluripotent stem cells? Where do the experts expect the next medical application will be for stem cells? Do stem cells promote regeneration? How are cell types interacting? How can induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells revolutionize drug discovery? Can cell therapies be made into a viable business? How close are we to finding the right business model? Are investors interested in stem cells today? What is the political and ethical landscape like now that the Obama administration has taken over the White House?

Source the-scientist.com Image Human embryonic stem cells - Wikimedia commons, Nissim Benvenisty

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) has established a much-awaited panel charged with deciding whether human embryonic stem cell (hESC) lines derived in the past eight years should be approved for use in NIH-funded research.

In March of this year, US President Barack Obama issued an executive order to overturn the embryonic stem cell policy implemented by former President George W. Bush, which outlawed federal funding for hESC lines derived after August 9, 2001. The new order allows for federal support of additional cell lines, provided they meet strict regulations regarding the embryo procurement process.

Source InSciences.com Image Source - Image: Microscopic image of a human cell (green cytoplasm, blue nucleus) loaded with mini-magnets (red)

Microscopic magnetic particles have been used to bring stem cells to sites of cardiovascular injury in a new method designed to increase the capacity of cells to repair damaged tissue, UCL scientists announced today.

Source Esciencenews.com Image Source - Wikimedia Commons

Published: Monday, August 17, 2009 - 11:44 in Health & Medicine

Researchers from Columbia University Medical Center's Herbert Irving Comprehensive Cancer Center have identified a protein that activates brain stem cells to make new neurons – but that may be hijacked later in life to cause brain cancer in humans. The protein called Huwe1 normally functions to eliminate other unnecessary proteins and was found to act as a tumor suppressor in brain cancer. These findings, published in the August 18 issue of Developmental Cell, were co-led by Antonio Iavarone, M.D., associate professor of neurology and pathology & cell biology and Anna Lasorella, M.D., assistant professor of pediatrics and pathology & cell biology, both of Columbia's Institute for Cancer Genetics at the Herbert Irving Comprehensive Cancer Center.

Source the-scientist.com Image Source - Wikimedia Commons

Stem cell researchers at the University of Minnesota are once again under investigation for falsifying data, New Scientist reported this week.

Earlier this year, New Scientist identified at least two potentially manipulated or duplicated images in a 2008 American Journal of Physiology paper coauthored by Jizhen Lin, a researcher in the Department of Otolaryngology in the university's medical school.

Here's something that people with poor or no vision will be excited about: three patients had their sight restored in less than a month by contact lenses cultured with stem cells.

All three patients were blind in one eye. The researchers extracted stem cells from their working eyes, cultured them in contact lenses for 10 days, and gave them to the patients. Within 10 to 14 days of use, the stem cells began recolonizing and repairing the cornea.

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A research team at the University of Louisville has found that stem cells taken from bone marrow may eventually restore vision to people who suffer from age related macular degeneration.

Stem cells can now be grown and transformed into specialized cells with characteristics consistent with cells of various tissues such as muscles or nerves through cell culture. Highly plastic adult stem cells from a variety of sources, including umbilical cord blood and bone marrow, are routinely used in medical therapies. Embryonic cell lines and autologous embryonic stem cells generated through therapeutic cloning have also been proposed as promising candidates for future therapies.

Mesenchymal stem cells are of great interest due to their ability to be injected intravenously and home to the area of injury, as well as the fact that they do not require matching with the recipient. To date, mesenchymal stem cells have been used in the treatment of spinal cord injury, heart failure, and many other indications.

The video describes the use of mesenchymal stem cells for the treatment of the autoimmune condition collagen induced arthritis (CIA), which is the current leading animal model for rheumatoid arthritis.

President Obama signed an order reversing the Bush administration's strict limits on human embryonic stem cell research.

From tiny embryonic cells to the large-scale physics of global warming, President Barack Obama urged researchers on Monday to follow science and not ideology as he abolished contentious Bush-era restraints on stem-cell research. "Our government has forced what I believe is a false choice between sound science and moral values," Obama declared as he signed documents changing U.S. science policy and removing what some researchers have said were shackles on their work.

By Malcom Ritter, AP Science Writer

NEW YORK (AP) - A U.S. biotech company says it plans to start this summer the world's first study of a treatment based on human embryonic stem cells - a long-awaited project aimed at spinal cord injury.

The company gained federal permission this week to inject eight to 10 patients with cells derived from embryonic cells, said Dr. Thomas Okarma, president and CEO of Geron Corp. of Menlo Park, Calif.

It was the kind of breakthrough scientists had dreamed of for decades and its promise to help cure disease appears to be fast on the way to being realized.

Researchers in November announced they were able to turn the clock back on skin cells and transform them into stem cells, the mutable building blocks of organs and tissues.

Then just earlier this month a different team announced it had cured sickle cell anemia in mice using stem cells derived from adult mouse skin.

"This is truly the Holy Grail: To be able to take a few cells from a patient -- say a cheek swab or few skin cells -- and turn them into stem cells in the laboratory," said Robert Lanza, a stem cell pioneer at Advanced Cell Technology.

"This work represents a tremendous scientific milestone - the biological equivalent of the Wright Brothers' first airplane," he told AFP.

What does Biotechnology have to do with me ?

An eye-opening video on how we currently stand with BioTechnology, and what the future may hold. This video explains in-depth the future directions that the biotech industry might take.

The United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity has come up with one of many definitions of biotechnology:

"Biotechnology has contributed towards the exploitation of biological organisms or biological processes through modern techniques, which could be profitably used in medicine, agriculture, animal husbandry and environmental cloning."

Japan’s leading genetics researcher could be “a matter of months” from reaching the Holy Grail of biotechnology – producing an “ethical” human stem cell without using a human embryo, he has said.

But in an exclusive interview with The Times, Shinya Yamanaka urged the scientific community: “Do not stop stem-cell research with human embryos, because patients will die if you do stop.” Although his work could transform the stem-cell field, speaking on the eve of his arrival in Britain to present research to geneticists, Professor Yamanaka emphasised that “right now, embryonic stem cells are vital to medical research”.

By Matt Canham

I’m sure you’ve already heard about Stem Cells. Maybe you saw a news story or a read a news article or saw the Presidential address. They are the most widely publicized scientific discovery today and with good reason. How about Embryonic Stem Cells? They have created a great deal of controversy and with good reason. The lure of what Embryonic Stem Cells can do for our health has led to ethical issues surrounding such things as embryo harvesting. One thing remains, Stem Cells represent the future of Health and Wellness as we know it. And they are here to stay.

UK scientists are turning to stem cell technology in the regeneration of eyesight lost as a result of an age-related disease that affects nearly a quarter of all over-60-year-olds.

A groundbreaking surgical therapy capable of stabilising and restoring vision in the vast majority of patients who currently suffer blindness through Age-Related Macular Degeneration (AMD) is to be taken to clinical trial by scientists and clinicians at the University College London (UCL) Institute of Ophthalmology, Moorfields Eye Hospital and the University of Sheffield.

The therapy, using cells derived from human embryonic stem cells to replace the faulty retinal cells that cause AMD, will be developed by the London Project to Cure AMD, a collaborative project launched today that brings together some of the leading specialists in the field.

By: Amy Shah

The very mention of the words “stem cell” perk up everyone’s ears. Although this topic is so controversial and exciting, do most people understand what stem cells are? This is a basic guide to stem cells with all the definitions, abbreviations, and applications you need to know to carry on a conversation about stem cell development, research, or controversy.

Cells - The Basic Unit of Life

Tissue for transplants could be available within three years if trials are successful

By: Alok Jha, science correspondent for the Guardian Unlimited

A British research team led by the world's leading heart surgeon has grown part of a human heart from stem cells for the first time. If animal trials scheduled for later this year prove successful, replacement tissue could be used in transplants for the hundreds of thousands of people suffering from heart disease within three years.

Sir Magdi Yacoub, a professor of cardiac surgery at Imperial College London, has worked on ways to tackle the shortage of donated hearts for transplant for more than a decade. His team at the heart science centre at Harefield hospital have grown tissue that works in the same way as the valves in human hearts, a significant step towards the goal of growing whole replacement hearts from stem cells.