Starting tomorrow I’m going to be at the ISSCR2016 meeting live blogging it in San Francisco. The annual ISSCR meeting is a great place to hear about all the latest research from basic findings to reports on pre-clinical and clinical studies. There are always valuable and unique insights from chatting with people too. I plan to …
Today a new Nature paper from Dr. Mary Herbert’s group in the UK has found a key problem with mitochondrial replacement therapy that fits with data from others. The goal of preventing mitochondrial disease using various kinds of genome transfer technologies is a noble one, but mitochondrial replacement therapy has faced a number of technological …
New Herbert lab Nature paper reinforces mitochondrial replacement Achilles heel Read More »
Adult stem cell biotech Mesoblast ($MESO) is in the unusual situation currently of having its stock on hold. This is a relatively rare event and usually portends some kind of major news. The hold is expected to run from June 1 to June 10. Mesoblast will announce ““material corporate developments with respect to certain assets …
Mesoblast stock on hold: Poll if you expect good or bad news Read More »
The second session at our CRISPR meeting was really powerful. As with other posts from the UC Davis CRISPR meeting, since I was taking notes on the fly during this session, this post is a stream of bits from the different talks, often trying to capture the essence of key questions or ideas as the speakers …
UC Davis CRISPR Meeting Panel: A View from the Trenches on Human Disease Read More »
The gene editing technology CRISPR has been arguably the top story in the biomedical world in the last two years, but going forward there is a CRISPR challenger in upstart gene editing technology NgAgo. For more background on NgAgo and the key first published paper on its genetic modification characteristics see my post here. In the comments on that …
NgAgo a-go-go: main bullet points on upstart CRISPR challenger Read More »
I am often critical of for-profit stem cell clinics on this blog for numerous reasons. For instance, one thing that concerns me greatly about these clinics is that they charge patients to get experimental “treatments” that have not been proven to be safe or effective. But as some patients have pointed out to me over the …
Huge clinical trial patient fees allowed by FDA at times, details often secret Read More »
Some stuff on my mind for our TGIF Science this week. Research Funding Ups: NIH. Is it my imagination or is NIH funding slightly improving? This is the overall vibe I’m hearing from the trenches. Research Funding Ups and Downs: CIRM. CIRM funded some basic research to the tune of a total of $4 million, …
TGIF Science: funding, CRISPR v. NgAgo, secrets, Zika, & more Read More »
2020 Update: early NgAgo reports have been mostly discredited and there is doubt on its function as a gene-editing method. What could be better than CRISPR for gene editing? A new genetic modification technology called NgAgo has some researchers really excited. How does it compare to CRISPR? I’ll admit it that as a scientist who works on …
Will new gene editing tech NgAgo challenge CRISPR? Read More »
Editor’s note. Caroline Simons attended both the April 28th (see her report on that here) and 29th Paris meetings on human gene editing/genetic modification. Today, we have her in depth report on the April 29th meeting. I have posted her piece in full with only minor edits. If you are in a rush you can …
In Depth Report from April 29th Paris Human Gene Edit Meeting Read More »
Editors note: This is a guest post from Caroline Simons who is attending the two Paris meetings on human gene editing. For more background on those meetings see here. By Caroline Simons There were just over a hundred participants at the workshop organized by the Federation of European Academies of Medicine, the UK Academy of …