Search Results for: human embryo

Interview with Roman Reed on Guv Grown’s Veto of AB714 Spinal Cord Injury Research Bill

February 1, 2021 / By / 2 Comments

Unfortunately California Guv Jerry Brown vetoed AB714, the Roman Reed Act that would have greatly supported spinal cord research. Roman Reed is of course a top stem cell patient advocate and driving force in research. Roman received my Stem Cell Person of the Year Award last year (See picture at right). The contest for the …

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Nominees for Stem Cell Person of the Year 2013: scientists, advocates, physicians, and the Pope

December 22, 2023 / By / 3 Comments

Nominations for Stem Cell Person of the Year 2013 closed last night and I ended up with a remarkable list of 30 nominees. I have included a few sentences about each one below, often taking verbiage directly from the nominator. The online voting on these nominees will start soon. The top vote getters will move …

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Stem cell journal club: dishing on Nature paper on making iPS cells inside mice

February 1, 2021 / By / 13 Comments

What if you could reprogram cells inside of an organism to a different fate and, for instance, make IPS cells? We can, right? But when most of us think about making induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells, we imagine it all happening in a little plastic dish in our labs or in our colleague’s labs, not …

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Stem Cell Pioneer Joanne Kurtzberg interview, Part 1

February 1, 2021 / By / 8 Comments
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Dr. Joanne Kurtzberg is a stem cell pioneer and has advanced the development of innovative stem cell therapies including those based on umbilical cord blood. She is a faculty member at Duke where she conducts her clinical research. I recently interviewed Dr. Kurtzberg and below is Part 1 of 2 of the interview. Part 2, …

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ACT patent filing for MSCs: of Dancing Mice & Multiple Sclerosis

February 1, 2021 / By / 16 Comments
dancing-mice

Is Advanced Cell Technology (ACT) on the road to cure Multiple Sclerosis (MS) using stem cells and specifically MSCs? Some folks seem to think it’s quite possible, but I remain skeptical. Still there have been some interesting developments. ACT has a relatively new patent filing for a mesenchymal stromal cell (MSC) product that was just …

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Jury is still out on purported adult pluripotent stem cells despite new MUSE paper

February 1, 2021 / By / 14 Comments
MUSE-cells

Are MUSE cells for real? Stem cells come in different types that vary in a key property called “potency”, but very few are pluripotent. The more potency, the greater the flexibility of a stem cell to make other cell types. Flexibility in the cellular world is power. The most powerful stem cells generally used are …

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Putting the IP in iPS cells: patent war looming?

February 1, 2021 / By / 20 Comments
war

Will intellectual property (IP) wars over patent rights to one of the most exciting new stem cell technologies hold back getting novel therapies to patients such as IPS cells? Unfortunately, it’s very possible. Induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells are very cool stem cells made from non-stem cells through a process called cellular reprogramming. iPS  cells …

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Why the extreme religious right are turning against iPS cells

February 1, 2021 / By / 5 Comments
Dr.-Oz-told-Oprah-and-Michael-J.-Fox-religious-right

There was a time, not so long ago, when the religious right hailed the discovery of induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells. Headlines blared from the extreme right on the Internet such as, “Embryonic stem cells obsolete”. Even the same kind of thing, saying, “The stem cell debate is dead”. You see opponents of embryonic stem …

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Meet Retina Institute of Japan: translating iPS cells

February 1, 2021 / By / 6 Comments
Retina-Institute-of-Japan

If you are wondering, “How will iPS cells get to help patients?” part of the answer is perhaps the big player and Japanese Institution, Riken and its arm Retina Institute of Japan. The stem cell field is still abuzz about induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells 7 years after their discovery. This amazing embryonic stem cell-like cells can …

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