For more than a decade now embryonic stem cell research has been one of the most high profile – and indeed controversial - areas of medical science, and it is an emerging field that owes a lot to animal studies performed by pioneers like Gail Martin of UCSF. Recently the field has begun to live … Continue reading Animal research unleashes the power of human embryonic stem cells
Tag: stem cell
Mice show the way to improved stem cell therapy for heart attacks
When the results of clinical trials do not live up to expectations from pre-clinical studies in animals it can be all too easy to ascribe the divergence to species differences, however scientists are increasingly aware that in many, even most cases, the problem may not be species differences but rather differences in the design of studies in … Continue reading Mice show the way to improved stem cell therapy for heart attacks
Transplanted astrocytes repair spinal cord damage in rat
A couple of weeks ago I discussed the launch of two clinical trials of brain machine interfaces designed to allow quadriplegic patients to control a newly designed prosthetic limb, during which I mentioned that scientists are also studying techniques that attempt to repair damage to spinal cords using stem cells. Several approaches have already shown … Continue reading Transplanted astrocytes repair spinal cord damage in rat
Breakthroughs of the year 2010: Looking Back and Looking Ahead
Every December Science, the magazine published weekly by the American Association for the Advancement of Science and ranking among among the most prestigious of scientific journals, publishes its list of the “Breakthrough of the Year”, and it affords us one last opportunity to look back on a few of the major developments we have discussed … Continue reading Breakthroughs of the year 2010: Looking Back and Looking Ahead
From the bench and the bedside; how animal research is taming Multiple Sclerosis
Multiple sclerosis (MS) is one of the most common diseases of the central nervous system – the brain and spinal cord - affecting about one person in every thousand in the USA. It is an inflammatory condition, where the immune system attacks the myelin sheath that surrounds the axons of nerve cells. Myelin is a … Continue reading From the bench and the bedside; how animal research is taming Multiple Sclerosis
Finding animal research in medical news
One of the things that often strikes me when reading about medical advances or clinical trials is how variable the reporting of basic and applied research, including animal research, that underpins the clinical research is. In some cases it is discussed in some depth, but far too often it is either skimmed over or not … Continue reading Finding animal research in medical news
Mice pave the way to a cord blood transplant advance
Leukemia is a cancer of the blood or bone marrow that affects over 200,000 Americans and still kills thousands every year despite the great progress made over recent decades in developing effective treatments for many leukemia types. When undergoing treatment for leukemia many patients require hematopoietic stem cell (HSC) transplantation to replace the blood stem … Continue reading Mice pave the way to a cord blood transplant advance
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