It’s been an exhausting week for anyone who cares about the NIH and biomedical research, but in today’s weekly reads I want to talk about another kind of fatigue: stem cell exhaustion.
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Stem cell exhaustion
What is stem cell exhaustion?
It’s when our stem cells lose either their ability to function or become depleted in numbers. Or both.
The end result in each case is that our body’s overall stem cell-dependent activities are impaired. This can contribute to serious illness and also aging. Our tissues and organs cannot fix themselves as easily.
A new article by scientist Sarallah Rezazadeh from the Icahn School of Medicine links stem cell exhaustion specifically with aging. Stem cell exhaustion and its role in healthy aging, Open Access Government. The piece touches briefly on ideas for slowing this cellular exhaustion, but we don’t seem very close to having something that would safely work.
The other thing that is relevant here is the idea of activating one’s stem cells. Stem cell supplement makers often invoke stem cell activation, but would that even be a good idea if it really could be done with supplements? You could eventually exhaust your stem cell pools. Stem cell activation could also stimulate pre-cancerous cells.
More recommended stem cell and regenerative reads
- Lineage Initiates Clinical Study of OPC1 for Spinal Cord Injury Safety Study of Stem Cell-derived Transplant Includes Subacute and Chronic SCI Patients, PR. Good news. I’ll have more on this in the next week or so.
- Iowa attorney general settles lawsuit against fake stem cell treatment executive, Des Moines Register. I highly recommend this article. From the piece, “Iowa Attorney General Brenna Bird settled a lawsuit against an executive of an Omaha-based stem cell treatment company that targeted Iowans with “unproven and dangerous” treatments…Michael Pavey, one of two named executives in the lawsuit, settled with the state of Iowa, which asked for several things, including paying $240,000 to Iowans who were targeted. The lawsuit alleged Pavey and his companies, among other executives, scammed Iowans by marketing and selling them fake stem cell treatments, violating the Iowa Consumer Fraud Act….Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller and Nebraska Attorney General Doug Peterson filed separate lawsuits in 2020 against Regenerative Medicine and Anti-Aging Institutes of Omaha, as well as Omaha Stem Cells LLC, Stem Cell Centers LLC, and the companies’ owners and top executives, Travis Autor, Emily Autor and Pavey.” Here’s some background: 2 State AG’s sue ‘Stem Cell Centers’ clinics including for alleged fraud.
- As outcry builds over Trump cuts to NIH payments, drugmakers are MIA, STAT News. Biotechs and pharma are scared of PO’ing POTUS. It’s understandable but not excusable. NIH research is the foundation for so much of what biotech and pharma do. Now with RFK Jr. officially being HHS Secretary I expect things will just get worse. Here are my initial thoughts on RFK Jr. as HHS Secretary.
- Stem Cell Shots Unveil a Safer Way To Treat Inflammatory Eye Diseases, Technology Networks.
- Why stem cell facelifts are rising, Rolling Out. I’ve written for years about stem cell facelifts. They are generally a really bad idea.
And finally we go on to:
The dumb stem cell thing of the week
What can one say about celebrities experimenting with stem cells?