What if I told you I believe that iPS cells really began in Seattle in the 1980s? Call me crazy? Read on. We hear a lot about how iPS cells were first created in 2006 in Japan by Shinya Yamanaka. I often say this myself. However, as is the case with so much in science, […]
How iPS cells germinated in part in Seattle in the 1980s Read More »
Of course stem cells and their caretakers never sleep or take the weekend off, right? But still TGIF! Last week we had some really good and some ugly stem cell headlines that I covered here. How was this week? Good. ES cell differentiation requires chromatin compaction. A PLoS Genetics paper by a team led by Yuhong
TGIF: stem cell headline weekly review for May 11 Read More »
A days ago the news came about Mesoblast not getting FDA approval for its MSC product for GvHD. The MSC area has had a rough few years with various clinical trials including for COVID. The “stem cells for heart disease” arena has also had a tough time. Here’s more news along these lines: BioCardia pauses enrollment in PhIII trial
Weekly reads: BioCardia, HeLa suit, illegal bio lab in CA Read More »
The big news of the week was the launch of Altos labs and their ambitious plan to tackle aging through cell therapies. Altos has recruited a large number of top cell biologists away from academia. That team plus top biotech execs and a $3B war chest make Altos one to watch in coming years. I
Weekly reads: aging, CRISPR delivery, hair, oocytes, paralysis Read More »
During the week as I’m doing other stuff I keep my eyes open for interesting things to read, including over the weekend about stem cell research, COVID, CRISPR, and more for The Niche weekly recommended reads. This week a lot was going as we updated The Niche site to our new theme and format. I
Recommended reads: jobs, FDA letter, & The Niche new look Read More »
Today’s post includes a list of firms/products that have self-reported that they have received FDA regenerative medicine advanced therapy designation or RMAT. Sometimes people call these “r mat” with a space. As of December 12, 2023 there are 85 RMATs in the public domain. I also include FDA data on RMAT submissions via an FDA RMAT resource
Updated FDA granted RMAT List (85) Read More »
The FDA issued a statement this week that there have been reports of new cases of blood cancer after patients received CAR-T therapies. The FDA specifically mentions T cell malignancies. New cancers in rare cases? In the announcement, FDA Investigating Serious Risk of T-cell Malignancy Following BCMA-Directed or CD19-Directed Autologous Chimeric Antigen Receptor (CAR) T cell
Some CAR-T may very rarely cause new cancers Read More »
Remember Paolo Macchiarini, the famous-turned-infamous so-called “stem cell surgeon” who ended up in legal trouble and with trial participants who died? Before we get into this we have a new feature for our weekly reads, which is the stem cell and regenerative medicine tweet of the week. See that at the bottom of the post.
Weekly reads: Macchiarini pub, cloned journal, Mammoth genome, tweet of the week Read More »
I wrote earlier this week about genome sequencing of famous dead celebrities, pointing out that the trend seems full of ethical complexities. Genome news More broadly, sequencing the genomes of non-celebrities from hundreds or thousands of years ago can be important research. A new NYT piece covers such work on the Swahili people. Such research
Weekly reads: genome sequencing, chemical reprogramming 2.0 Read More »
If you’ve never heard of the KRAS G12C mutation, it’s a particularly frightening mutation present in numerous cancers. Like the MYC oncogene, many people view mutations in RAS as undruggable, but new efforts show some glimmers of hope. The drug Sotorasib has been approved by the FDA to target the KRAS G12C mutation. Here’s a
Weekly reads: KRAS G12C, eLife journal controversy, bird iPSCs Read More »