Chinese Stem Cell Medicine

"In China's Guangdong Province there's been 'almost miraculous' progress in actually using stem cells to treat diseases such as brain injury, cerebral palsy, ataxia and other optic nerve damage, lower limb ischemia, autism, spinal muscular atrophy, and multiple sclerosis. One Chinese biotech company, Beike, is now building a 21,500 square foot stem cell storage facility and hiring professors from American universities such as Stanford. Two California families even flew their children to China for a cerebral palsy treatment that isn't available in the US. The founder of Beike is so enthusiastic, he says his company is exploring the concept of using stem cells to extend longevity beyond 120 years."

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Synthetic human blood

British scientists are on course to become the first to create synthetic human blood from embryonic stem cells.

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Worms help find cure for muscle-wasting diseases

Dr Nathaniel Szewczyk, from the Institute of Clinical Research in Derby, will study the signals that control muscle protein degradation in worms.

His work centres on the microscopic worm, Caenorhabditis elegans.

These worms are the perfect substitute for studying long term changes in human physiology because they suffer from muscle atrophy - muscle loss - under many of the same conditions that people do.

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Bone Marrow Stem Cells Used To Regenerate Skin

A new study suggests that adult bone marrow stem cells can be used in the construction of artificial skin. The findings mark an advancement in wound healing and may be used to pioneer a method of organ reconstruction.

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Stem Cell Progress

A British biotechnology company, working with a team of doctors in Scotland, is to launch a pioneering clinical trial to assess whether stem cell therapy can help patients left disabled by stroke.

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Regrowing Teeth

In a few years dentists will treat periodontal disease with regeneration by using stem cells to create hard and soft tissue; they will take out a tooth that is about to fall, and reconnect it firmly to the regenerated tissue. Although nobody is predicting when it will be possible to grow teeth on demand, in adults, to replace missing ones, a common guess is five to ten years.

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Stem cell therapy reversing brain birth defects

Scientists at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem have succeeded in reversing brain birth defects in animal models, using stem cells to replace defective brain cells.
The work of Prof. Joseph Yanai and his associates at the Hebrew University-Hadassah Medical School was presented at the Tel Aviv Stem Cells Conference last spring and is expected to be presented and published nest year at the seventh annual meeting of the International Society for Stem Cell Research in Barcelona, Spain.

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