Advanced Cell Technology (ACT; stock symbol ACTC) announced that it has secured $35 million in funding from investment company, Lincoln Park Capital. The press release quotes CEO Gary Rabin: “We are most pleased about this financing agreement, as it has a number of notable benefits for the company,” commented Gary Rabin, chairman and CEO of […]
Stem Cell Biotech Advanced Cell Technology (ACT) gets $35 million Read More »
What will we define as a success for any given stem cell biotech like ViaCyte? In academia, even if we do pre-clinical, translational kind of biomedical sciences, we still do not often think about what it takes to succeed in industry. Even if we very much want our research to make a difference for patients,
What is the valley of death of science and biotech? For those of us conducting stem cell research, especially human stem cell research, I don’t have to tell you how expensive it is. Even just doing pre-clinical or basic science research costs a fortune. When you start talking about the kind of pre-clinical research specifically
The valley of death: stem cells, biotechs, and money Read More »
Who’s who in the field of iPS cells? In this post, I examine the people, journals, places, funding agencies, and companies that are the leaders in the iPS cell field. I start with publishing. Last year we did a post on publishing trends in the iPS cell field. It suggested that the iPS cell field was
Who’s who in iPS cells: scientists, journals, funding agencies, countries, and biotechs Read More »
How is Geron doing along with other stem cell biotechs? What’s going on these days with biotech companies working on stem cell-based products? Geron and ACT Geron’s and Advanced Cell Technology (ACT)’s FDA-approved trials presumably continue. As expected, no news yet. It’s too soon. Two important questions regarding both these companies are (1) did they
Stem cell biotech updates: Geron, ACT, Neuralstem, Pfizer Read More »
Is there a proven stem cell therapy for vision loss? When I started The Niche back in early 2010, one major area of hope was that there might one day be a stem cell therapy for vision loss or even blindness. Maybe even a cure for blindness. While we’re not there yet as a field,
What are the most significant stem cell and regenerative medicine good news stories of 2024? Since it has been an eventful year, there are many possibilities. Please see our poll at the bottom of this post and weigh in on what you think is the most important encouraging news. If you don’t see your choice
Poll on stem cell & regenerative medicine good news of 2024 Read More »
Cancer stem cells are stem cell-like cells in many tumors that are key contributors to the ability of tumors to persist and recur after treatment. For those reasons, they are also thought to be major targets, including of emerging therapies. Data also suggest that some therapies may create new types of cancer stem cells leading
Weekly reads: cancer stem cells, encouraging findings, Trump & NIH, proteomics Read More »
The cell therapy biotech Capricor recently released new data from their Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (DMD) trial work. The data have generated excitement in the patient advocacy community. The stock has skyrocketed. How exciting are these new data? CEO Linda Marbán is quite upbeat and I think it’s justified. The firm is now seeking FDA approval
Capricor seeks FDA approval of deramiocel for Duchenne based on encouraging data Read More »
The Parent’s Guide to Cord Blood Foundation recently announced that Cryo-Cell and its long-time partner, a Duke pediatric cell therapy team, have made a key change. They will begin offering infusions of unrelated, unproven cord blood to pediatric patients with cerebral palsy (CP). These are called donor infusions. Up until now, they had mainly focused