For a few years, biophysicist He Jiankui might have been one of the most recognizable scientists on the planet. He made three “CRISPR babies” or gene edited people. However, his gene editing went badly and as best as we can tell his efforts did not result in precision edits. It’s unclear if he had institutional […]
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
Cord blood banker Cryo-Cell and Duke have had a long-running agreement. The potentially multi-million dollar deal has focused on the development of possible umbilical cord blood therapies for pediatric patients. A major first goal has been to open an infusion clinic, which I have been very skeptical about for various reasons. For instance, one big
Cryo-Cell alleges Duke acted “fraudulently” related to pediatric cord cell deal Read More »
The International Society for Cell & Gene Therapy or ISCT is a great organization in our field. They have launched a new guide to help healthcare providers navigate this complex area. Click on the image below to check it out. This new resource is important because healthcare providers, researchers, and the public need authoritative information.
ISCT launches new resource on unproven cell & gene therapies Read More »
This year already appears to be a record one for cell and tissue therapy-related warning letters the FDA. Directly or indirectly, these come from the FDA’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research or CBER. Something unusual seems to be happening. FDA’s CBER has been exceptionally active in 2024 including on cell & tissue products I’ve
Big spike in FDA warning letters to unproven biologics firms Read More »
Today’s post is a review and fact-check of stem cell supplements. This is the second time I have looked at the state of stem cell supplements. The number of supplements has greatly increased. Supplements | Stem cell supplements claims | Stem cell activators | Supplement marketing | Visiclear, Visifree & Visishield | Stem-Kine | Regenexx supplements | Big
New review of stem cell supplements and pills Read More »
If only humans could master regeneration. It seems like that would open the door to far better health. Maybe to longer life too. We can see how many other creatures innately can regenerate organs. I can see it in the lizards that run around in my garden. Every now and then I see one with
Neuralink has had a rollercoaster ride in the last few years with many ups and downs. They just recently deployed a brain implant into a second clinical trial participant. So it’s a good time to update where things stand. This more general area of science is often called brain-computer interface (BCI) research. The implants are
Neuralink on the brain: another person gets implant Read More »
The private cord blood bank industry has promised families all kinds of great things over the years. A typical ad for such cord blood banks might say, “Your child may need cord blood in the future for a cure.” The industry also often uses the analogy of frozen cord blood as an insurance policy for
What if we could make robots that possess human brain-like structures? Chinese scientists have reportedly made such robots that are each guided at least in part by a small amount of lab-grown brain tissue. These cyborg-like creations, which are being trained to perform specific tasks, also have standard computer chips. How much does the human
On the road to Cylons? Robots with human brain tissue reported Read More »