Studying brain disorders is complicated for many reasons, not the least being the ethics of obtaining living neurons. To overcome that obstacle, UC San Francisco postdoc Aditi Deshpande, PhD, is starting with skin cells.

Thanks to developments in stem cell technology, new information about the human brain is now being gleaned from a simple cheek swab or skin sample. This technology is key to the kind of progress Despande and researchers like her are making. It allows them to work with cells otherwise unobtainable living brain cells that have the same genetics as the patients.

Deshpande begins with skin cells obtained from the Simons Foundation from volunteers whose DNA contains a specific deletion or duplication of one chromosome. She cultures these cells and then turns them into induced pluripotent stem cells cells that have been coaxed back to their embryonic state and are able to become any other type of cell. From there, she reprograms them to become a specific type of neuron thats involved in attention and information processing.

The deletion or duplication Deshpande is looking for stems from a 2008 finding by Lauren Weiss, PhD, an associate professor of neurology in the UCSF Department of Psychiatry and the UCSF Institute for Human Genetics.

Weiss discovered a 29-gene region of DNA on chromosome 16 that is associated with autism, seizures and other brain disorders. Normally, a person has two copies of the region one on each copy of chromosome 16. In some of Deshpandes samples, the region is deleted from one chromosome, leaving one copy. In others, the region is duplicated, resulting in three copies. Subjects with only one copy of the region were more likely to have macrocephaly an enlarged brain than a typical subject, and those with three copies were more likely to have microcephaly a smaller brain.

Whats really interesting, said Deshpande, is that although these subjects seem to have opposite features in terms of brain size, we see a related effect, based on whether they have fewer or more copies of the region.

Some known models of autism show a connection between a neurons growth or appearance and macrocephaly, she explained. We wanted to know if the same thing is happening here.

To compare the effect of the mutation, Deshpande first stains the obtained skin cells so that she can visualize the neurons under a microscope. After staining, Deshpande used cell-counting software to assess several thousands of neurons from deletion and duplication samples and measure them against normal neurons. She found that the neurons missing the DNA region exhibited some differences compared to typical neurons.

Her next step in her research is to discern which of the regions 29 genes are involved in these differences.

The work is meticulous, but Deshpande doesnt mind. I simply love looking at neurons, she said. It really makes you appreciate the complexity of the brain.

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Science in Focus: Creating Neurons from Skin Cells to Understand Autism - UCSF News Services

Skin Stem Cells Comments Off on Science in Focus: Creating Neurons from Skin Cells to Understand Autism – UCSF News Services | March 16th, 2017

The first new finding is an obvious onethe mouse experiments worked in human cells. Just because something worked in mice doesn't necessarily mean it will work in people too. So this is a really important finding.

The second important finding has to do with the specific genes each group used. Both groups added four genes to turn a stem cell into an ES cell. But they used a slightly different set of genes.

The Japanese group added OCT3/4, SOX2, KLF4, and c-MYC. The Wisconsin group added OCT4, SOX2, NANOG, and LIN28. This matters because of a side effect seen in the previous mouse study.

The mouse study went farther than the human study in that the researchers added these new ES cells to a mouse embryo. The results were disconcerting. Around 20% of the mice developed cancer from the cells. The researchers hypothesized that the cause was one or more of the genes that were used to create the ES cell.

By using different sets of genes in the human cell study, the researchers showed you don't need the same four genes to create an ES cell. The hope is that the researchers will find a combination of genes that do not cause cancer.

Once the scientists find a set of genes that don't cause cancer, this research should blow the stem cell field wide open. We still don't know if ES cells will work to actually cure disease. But ethical ES cells should open the spigot of federal funds so American scientists can finally research this subject to its full extent. Then we'll see if ES cells can really live up to their hype. Or if we need to pursue other ways to cure these illnesses.

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Human Embryonic Stem (ES) Cells from Skin Cells ...

Skin Stem Cells Comments Off on Human Embryonic Stem (ES) Cells from Skin Cells … | March 15th, 2017

March 15, 2017 by Grove Potter The four images, from left to right, show Keratinocyte-derive neural crest stem cells turning into neurons as shown by typical neuronal morphology. Credit: University at Buffalo.

A discovery, several years in the making, by a University at Buffalo research team has proven that adult skin cells can be converted into neural crest cells (a type of stem cell) without any genetic modification, and that these stem cells can yield other cells that are present in the spinal cord and the brain.

The practical implications could be very significant, from studying genetic diseases in a dish to generating possible regenerative cures from the patient's own cells.

"It's actually quite remarkable that it happens," says Stelios T. Andreadis, PhD, professor and chair of UB's Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, who recently published a paper on the results in the journal Stem Cells.

The identity of the cells was further confirmed by lineage tracing experiments, where the reprogrammed cells were implanted in chicken embryos and acted just as neural crest cells do.

Stem cells have been derived from adult cells before, but not without adding genes to alter the cells. The new process yields neural crest cells without addition of foreign genetic material. The reprogrammed neural crest cells can become smooth muscle cells, melanocytes, Schwann cells or neurons.

"In medical applications this has tremendous potential because you can always get a skin biopsy," Andreadis says. "We can grow the cells to large numbers and reprogram them, without genetic modification. So, autologous cells derived from the patient can be used to treat devastating neurogenic diseases that are currently hampered by the lack of easily accessible cell sources."

The process can also be used to model disease. Skin cells from a person with a genetic disease of the nervous system can be reprogrammed into neural crest cells. These cells will have the disease-causing mutation in their chromosomes, but the genes that cause the mutation are not expressed in the skin. The genes are likely to be expressed when cells differentiate into neural crest lineages, such as neurons or Schwann cells, thereby enabling researchers to study the disease in a dish. This is similar to induced pluripotent stem cells, but without genetic modification or reprograming to the pluripotent state.

The discovery was a gradual process, Andreadis says, as successive experiments kept leading to something new. "It was one step at a time. It was a very challenging task that took almost five years and involved a wide range of expertise and collaborators to bring it to fruition," Andreadis says. Collaborators include Gabriella Popescu, PhD, professor in the Department of Biochemistry in the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences at UB; Song Liu, PhD, vice chair of biostatistics and bioinformatics at Roswell Park Cancer Institute and a research associate professor in biostatistics UB's School of Public Health and Health Professions; and Marianne Bronner, PhD, professor of biology and biological engineering, California Institute of Technology.

Andreadis credits the persistence of his then-PhD student, Vivek K. Bajpai, for sticking with it.

"He is an excellent and persistent student," Andreadis says. "Most students would have given up." Andreadis also credits a seed grant from UB's office of the Vice President for Research and Economic Development's IMPACT program that enabled part of the work.

The work recently received a $1.7 million National Institutes of Health grant to delve into the mechanisms that occur as the cells reprogram, and to employ the cells for treating the Parkinson's-like symptoms in a mouse model of hypomyelinating disease.

"This work has the potential to provide a novel source of abundant, easily accessible and autologous cells for treatment of devastating neurodegenerative diseases. We are excited about this discovery and its potential impact and are grateful to NIH for the opportunity to pursue it further," Andreadis said.

The research is described in the journal Stem Cells under the title "Reprogramming Postnatal Human Epidermal Keratinocytes Toward Functional Neural Crest Fates."

Explore further: Embryonic gene Nanog reverses aging in adult stem cells

More information: Vivek K. Bajpai et al, Reprogramming Postnatal Human Epidermal Keratinocytes Toward Functional Neural Crest Fates, STEM CELLS (2017). DOI: 10.1002/stem.2583

Journal reference: Stem Cells

Provided by: University at Buffalo

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Scientists at the University of Newcastle, UK, have used a combination of small molecules to turn cells isolated from human skin into Schwann cells - the specialised cells that support nerves and play a role in nerve repair. ...

Johns Hopkins stem cell biologists have found a way to reprogram a patient's skin cells into cells that mimic and display many biological features of a rare genetic disorder called familial dysautonomia. The process requires ...

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From skin to brain: Stem cells without genetic modification - Phys.Org

Skin Stem Cells Comments Off on From skin to brain: Stem cells without genetic modification – Phys.Org | March 15th, 2017

RenovaCare Inc. (OTCQB:RCAR) is a New York City-based biotechnology company developing its patented CellMist and SkinGun stem cell technologies for treating burns in weeks or less as well as treating chronic and acute wounds, acne scarring, and skin defects and diseases. In December, it received a U.S. patent for its SkinGun device.

Before joining RenovaCare, CEO Thomas Bold was CEO of StemCell Systems. He has more than 15 years of experience in medical biotechnology device manufacturing and stem cell platform development.

Harlan Levy: How does your CellMist technology specifically work?

Thomas Bold: Doctors isolate a high concentration of the most desirable stem cell population from a very small donor sample of the patient's own skin and suspended in the liquid CellMist Solution. It's then gently sprayed onto wound sites using our SkinGun, which looks like Captain Kirk's particle-beam gun, the "Phaser" in the Star Trek TV series.

The isolated cells include cells that proliferate rapidly in order to achieve quick re-epithelialization. This is the stage at which a burn is technically considered "healed" and patients are often discharged. The average person would recognize this healing phase as the point at which the wound develops a thin, shiny, pink-colored protective layer.

H.L.: What are existing burn treatments, and how do they compare with the SkinGun treatment?

T.B.: Traditional skin grafting has been the treatment for burns and wounds for centuries. More recently, mesh grafting has become the latest standard of care. This process surgically removes large sheets of healthy skin from the patient. Following this painful donor procedure, the sheet is punctured in a grid-like pattern to form an expandable mesh. Surgeons pull this mesh as wide as feasible and surgically stitch this skin to the patient's wound. The procedure is extremely painful, creates an additional wound at each donor site and results in poor cosmetic outcomes, often with scarred and deformed skin.

This transplanted skin can result in restricted joint movement and is unable to grow with the patient. Consequently, mesh graft patients require months and sometimes up to a year of physical therapy and can face psychological problems from the permanent disfigurement of scarring. In addition, long-term pain management with painkillers is very often necessary.

With the RenovaCare treatment technology, by spraying the patient's stem cells, the SkinGun overcomes the need for removing large sheets of donor skin, and the resultant healing does not require prolonged physical therapy. The spray procedure is gentle, and the skin that regrows looks, feels, and functions as the original skin that it replaces. Most often the healing process takes only a week.

It's very important to note here that a sheet of meshed skin covers only up to six times its original donor area. The RenovaCare system covers up to 100 times its donor skin sample. This is why the donor skin sample can be so small compared to the injured treatment area.

H.L.: What about scars and infection potential compared with conventional treatments?

T.B.: A wound heals from the edges towards the middle. The bigger the wound, the longer this process takes. And the longer this process takes, the higher the risk of infection and scarring.

Imagine a large burn of 20, 30, 40 percent of your total body surface. With our CellMist System, the doctor sprays the patient's own stem cells with a highly regenerative capacity onto the wound and, by doing so, creates tens of thousands of little regenerative islands across the wound. These islands grow outwards, ultimately connecting to each other to create a protective epithelial skin layer that covers the wound.

Experts believe the formation of this pink-colored layer marks the moment of re-epithelization where the risk of infection is reduced and the patient's wound is effectively healed. Beyond this stage, the cosmetic healing process also happens entirely natural to produce a scar-free result where, finally, skin color, tone and pigmentation are restored.

Since the RenovaCare spray procedure uses the patient's own stem cells, there isn't the risk of tissue rejection, infection, or ongoing immuno suppression therapy.

H.L.: What results have you found for patients using the SkinGun?

T.B.: We have many examples of patients recovering from severe burns within a week or two, scar-free, and walking away with unlimited joint restrictions.

In the case of one patient with severe electrical burns to over a third of his body, we were able to spray his wounds with 23 million stem cells isolated from a tiny two-inch-by two-inch sample of his own skin. Within five days of treatment, his chest and arms were already healed. Four days later, the patient was discharged from the hospital.

It's also important to note that reconstructive surgery for burn patients is especially challenging when tackling joints in the body. To this end, the authors of a case study in the reputable journal "Burns," said, "Cell-spray grafting is also especially suitable for hands and joint areas, where prolonged times to re-epithelization may significantly impact functionality and esthetic outcome."

H.L.: What different uses does the SkinGun have beside burns?

T.B.: Currently, we are focusing on severe second-degree burns, but we see the RenovaCare technology also applicable for other indications such as cosmetic procedures targeting skin pigmentation disorders, scar treatment, and other related conditions.

Our goal is to bring to market the world's most advanced technology for skin repair using a patient's own stem cells.

H.L.: Is there a record of the SkinGun use in the States and abroad?

T.B.: Having treated 72 burn patients to date, the company's early clinical target is burns with follow-on indications, including chronic wounds and cosmetic procedures.

H.L.: How much research went into creating the SkinGun and over what time period?

T.B.: The birth of RenovaCare technology goes back to the early 2000s in Berlin, Germany. Researchers, at that time, were trying to "grow" skin by seeding stem cells inside multi-dimensional bioreactors. They soon discovered that these artificial chambers were no match for the growth of the same cells when transplanted inside a human body; thus, the birth of a concept to use a patient's own wound as a natural bioreactor.

A study published in "Advances in Plastic Surgery" highlights 19 early patients with deep dermal wound burns to the face and neck, complex three-dimensional surfaces. Researchers achieved such outstanding results using our cell spray that they refused to perform further skin grafting. Instead, surgeons adopted our founding technology as their standard of care.

Let me quote from the surgeons' study, which states

"We refuse to perform a prospective randomized study with groups in which traditional skin grafting and/or wound healing are still applied for the therapy for deep dermal burns due to the excellent results in our study. The method of CEA spray application has become our standard of care for these indications. The faster wound closure, the promotion of spontaneous wound healing by keratinocyte application, as well as the preservation of donor sites are further advantages of the method."

The same paper concluded that "using a spray technique results in excellent cosmetic outcomes compared with any other method."

H.L.: How has the technology changed since then?

T.B.: Since the time of this early approach, our technology has evolved and matured significantly. Our cell isolation no longer requires complex procedures, culturing, expansion, and processing time, and our stem cell spray device no longer requires multiple hand-assembled parts. Its independent power and flow-control unit has been condensed in size from a 2-foot cube down to a 9-volt battery placed inside the handle of a single handheld spray gun.

H.L.: What is the potential market for the technology in dollars and number of patients?

T.B.: Conservatively speaking, the market for our technology exceeds $50 billion. There are nearly a million people who suffer from burns each year in the U.S. alone. According to the American Burn Association, burn injuries continue to be one of the leading causes of accidental death and injury in the U.S, and one civilian fire death occurs every two hours and forty minutes.

H.L.: How much would you estimate the treatment cost may be for each different use?

T.B.: The SkinGun technology is currently under development and not approved for clinical use in the U.S., so it's too early to talk about what the treatment will cost. We have always been mindful of reimbursement, and nearly two years ago, we commissioned an investigation into the reimbursement pathway for our CellMist System. We know that reimbursement opportunities are available by way of current coding and practices.

We have further investigated and evaluated the "bundling" approach currently advocated for by insurers and are confident that that our technology is well placed to take advantages of any shift towards such a model.

H.L: What is the schedule to get Federal Drug Administration clearance?

T.B.: In order to achieve FDA clearance for the CellMist System and the SkinGun, we will be working to show our technology is safe and prove its efficacy within applicable clinical trial formats and according to the relevant regulatory requirements. I can't speculate as to how long the FDA clearance process will take, and, therefore, it's hard to speculate when our product will be commercialized.

H.L.: What other products are you investigating and how may they work?

T.B.: We are focusing on bringing the SkinGun and our stem cell spray technology to market at this time.

H.L.: What is your background, including age, education, prior employment?

T.B.: Before joining RenovaCare I worked as the CEO of StemCell Systems GmbH, a Berlin-based biomedical company engaged in the development and commercialization of advanced cell culture bioreactors. I have more than 15 years of professional business experience in the field of medical biotechnology device manufacturing, stem cell culture technology platform development and regenerative medicine research project management and product development. I also co-founded several start-up companies in Germany.

Disclosure: I/we have no positions in any stocks mentioned, and no plans to initiate any positions within the next 72 hours.

I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it (other than from Seeking Alpha). I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.

Editor's Note: This article discusses one or more securities that do not trade on a major U.S. exchange. Please be aware of the risks associated with these stocks.

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RenovaCare: Stem Cell Treatment Heals Burns In Weeks Not Months - Seeking Alpha

Skin Stem Cells Comments Off on RenovaCare: Stem Cell Treatment Heals Burns In Weeks Not Months – Seeking Alpha | March 15th, 2017

ScienceBlog.com (blog)

Science in Focus: Creating Neurons from Skin Cells to Understand Autism ScienceBlog.com (blog) Studying brain disorders is complicated for many reasons, not the least being the ethics of obtaining living neurons. To overcome that obstacle, UC San Francisco postdoc Aditi Deshpande, PhD, is starting with skin cells. Thanks to developments in stem ... and more »

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Science in Focus: Creating Neurons from Skin Cells to Understand Autism - ScienceBlog.com (blog)

Skin Stem Cells Comments Off on Science in Focus: Creating Neurons from Skin Cells to Understand Autism – ScienceBlog.com (blog) | March 15th, 2017

The Scientist

Antibody Therapy Targets Cancer Stem Cells: Study The Scientist Illustration of a cancer stem cellVIMEO, LEE HEALTHCancer stem cells (CSCs) are thought to enable tumor evolutionthey're genomically unstable, primed for metastasis, and difficult to destroy. The stem cell theory of cancer suggests that conventional ... and more »

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Antibody Therapy Targets Cancer Stem Cells: Study - The Scientist

Skin Stem Cells Comments Off on Antibody Therapy Targets Cancer Stem Cells: Study – The Scientist | March 15th, 2017

March 15, 2017 Credit: Universit du Luxembourg

Stem cells are unspecialised cells that can develop into any type of cell in the human body. So far, however, scientists only partially understand how the body controls the fate of these all-rounders, and what factors decide whether a stem cell will differentiate, for example, into a blood, liver or nerve cell. Researchers from the Luxembourg Centre for Systems Biomedicine (LCSB) of the University of Luxembourg and an international team have now identified an ingenious mechanism by which the body orchestrates the regeneration of red and white blood cells from progenitor cells. "This finding can help us to improve stem cell therapy in future," says Dr. Alexander Skupin, head of the "Integrative Cell Signalling" group of LCSB.

Although all cells in an organism carry the same genetic blueprints the same DNA some of them act as blood or bone cells, for example, while others function as nerve or skin cells. Researchers already understand quite well how individual cells work. But how an organism is able to create such a diversity of cells from the same genetic template and how it manages to relocate them to wherever they are needed in the body is still largely unknown. In order to learn more about this process, Alexander Skupin and his team treated blood stem cells from mice with growth hormones and then watched closely how these progenitor cells behaved during their differentiation into white or red blood cells. The researchers observed that the cells' transformation does not occur in linear, targeted fashion, but rather more opportunistically. Each progenitor cell adapts to the needs of its environment and integrates itself into the body where new cells are needed. "So, it is not as though the cell takes a ticket at the beginning of its differentiation and then travels straight to its destination. Rather, it gets off frequently to look around and see which line is best to take," Alexander Skupin explains.

By this clever mechanism, a multicellular organism can adapt the regrowth of new cells to its current needs. "Before progenitor cells differentiate once and for all, they first lose their stem cell character and then check, as it were, which cell line is currently in demand. Only then do they develop into the cell type that best suits their characteristics and which prevails in their environment," Alexander Skupin says. The researcher likens this step to a game of roulette, where the different types of cells can be thought of as the differently numbered slots in the roulette wheel that catch the ball. "When the cells lose their stem cell character, they are quasi thrown into the roulette wheel, where they first bounce around aimlessly. Only when they have found the right environment do the cells then drop into that niche like the roulette ball falling into a numbered slot and differentiate definitively." This way, the body can orchestrate its cell regeneration and at the same time prevent stem cells from being misdirected too early. "Even if a cell takes a wrong turn, it is ultimately sorted out again if its characteristics are unsuitable for the niche, or slot, it has landed in," says Skupin.

With their study, Alexander Skupin and his team have shown for the first time that a progenitor cell's fate is not clearly predetermined and does not follow a straight line. "This observation contradicts the current doctrine that stem cells are programmed to follow a certain lineage from the beginning," Alexander Skupin says. The researcher is furthermore convinced that the processes are similar for other progenitor cells. "In the lab, we have observed the same differentiation pattern in so-called iPS cells, or induced pluripotent stem cells, which can transform into many different types of cells."

This knowledge can help the researchers to improve the effectiveness of therapies in future. Stem cell therapy involves administering a patient his or her own body's stem cells in order to replace other cells that have died as a result of an affliction such as Parkinson's disease. While this promising treatment method has been intensively researched over many years, there has so far been only limited practical success in endogenous stem cell therapy. It is also highly controversial, since it is frequently accompanied by severe side effects and it cannot be ruled out that some cells might degenerate and lead to cancer. "Because we now have a better understanding of how the body influences the direction in which stem cells differentiate, we can hopefully control this process better in future," Alexander Skupin concludes.

Explore further: Genetic factors control regenerative properties of blood-forming stem cells

More information: Mitra Mojtahedi et al. Cell Fate Decision as High-Dimensional Critical State Transition, PLOS Biology (2016). DOI: 10.1371/journal.pbio.2000640

Researchers from the UCLA Department of Medicine, Division of Hematology Oncology and the Eli and Edythe Broad Center of Regenerative Medicine and Stem Cell Research at UCLA have published two studies that define how key ...

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Though immune therapy and regenerative medicine are promising areas of research for future medical therapies, they are limited today by the difficulty of creating stem cells, and scientists around the world are searching ...

Hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs) can differentiate into all of the different types of cells that comprise the blood and immune cell lineages. HSC transplantation is the only effective treatment for certain blood disorders; ...

A*STAR researchers and colleagues have developed a method to isolate and expand human heart stem cells, also known as cardiac progenitor cells, which could have great potential for repairing injured heart tissue.

So they can't use smartphones or WiFi, but bacteria have evolved some seriously complex strategies to communicate with one another. And the resulting interactions are a delicate balance of cooperation and, in some cases, ...

New research led by the UK's Centre for Ecology & Hydrology has revealed for the first time that flower-rich habitats are key to enhancing the survival of bumblebee families between years.

A discovery, several years in the making, by a University at Buffalo research team has proven that adult skin cells can be converted into neural crest cells (a type of stem cell) without any genetic modification, and that ...

The evolution of land animals has been shaped by barriers such as oceans and mountains which have divided them and sent them down different genetic paths.

(Phys.org)A trio of researchers with Anglia Ruskin University in the U.K. and the Australian National University has found that the male fiddler crab uses its oversized claw to get the attention of a prospective mate and ...

A 60-year-old mystery has been solved by biochemists at The University of Western Australia investigating the origin of a type of digestion-inhibiting proteins thought only to exist in two plant families that contain the ...

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Researchers decipher how the body controls stem cells - Phys.Org

Skin Stem Cells Comments Off on Researchers decipher how the body controls stem cells – Phys.Org | March 15th, 2017

Vampire facials sound like a totally modern sci-fi development, but people have thought that drinking or slathering on blood can heal and renew for millennia. Pliny the Elder, nearly 2,000 years ago, wrote, [e]pileptic patients are in the habit of drinking the blood even of gladiators, draughts teeming with life. Elizabeth Bthory, a noblewoman from early modern Hungary, was said to have murdered virgins and then bathed in their blood in order to retain her youth. (Its worthwhile to note that King Louis XV and Marie Antoinette were also accused of bathing in their subjects blood.) In the stories, Bthory literally soaks up the youth of virgins via contact with their blood.

We think topically applied and ingested blood, bones, organs, and cells are magical sources of life force, health, and youth that somehow surpass the efficacy of less gory, more common ingredients.

The tales of blood baths seem spurious to say the least, and apparently theyre not backed up by primary evidence. But the fact that people have been passing the stories along for centuries tells us something about how we think. Even now, we seem to really dig the idea of applying or consuming human cells for the purpose of absorbing beauty and health from them. Vampire facelifts and Dr. Barbara Sturms MC1 cream make use of plasma from ones own blood drawn and separated in-office to supposedly renew skin. We think topically applied and ingested blood, bones, organs, and cells are magical sources of life force, health, and youth that somehow surpass the efficacy of less gory, more common ingredients.

Ingredients associated with conception, birth, and nursing seem to particularly excite us. Semen facials inadvisable and groan-worthy seem to make the rounds again when clicks are needed. In Korea, the brand Isa Knox uses recombinant human placenta protein (rHPP-8TM) in the Tervina line, supplied by the CHA Placenta Institute (part of the CHA Global Medical Network that includes a university medical school and institutes for stem cell and cosmetics research).

In the case of human stem cell skincare, companies have slapped a veneer of science on our old magical beliefs to ratchet up prices and expectations.

The idea of human ingredients is so seductive that people pay extra for them even when theyre not actually in the products. A Korean beauty product nicknamed mothers milk, Eureque Muru Mor Cream, contains no human milk, just baby powder fragrance and animal milk extracts that are supposed to be similar to human breast milk. If youre looking for the real deal, check out Mud Facial Bar, which offers an ethically sourced, $10 breast milk add-on for its facials.

In the case of human stem cell skincare, companies have slapped a veneer of science on our old magical beliefs to ratchet up prices and expectations. Stem cells here Im talking about pluripotent human stem cells can be manipulated to become any cell type in the human body under the right conditions and divide essentially without limit to replenish other cells as long as the person or animal is still alive according to the National Institutes of Health.

The twist is that stem cell skincare brands such as Lifeline Skin Care dont actually use whole, live human stem cells in their products. An actual stem cell would need to be kept alive in a skin cream, and that would certainly be challenging to accomplish, according to cosmetic chemist Kelly Dobos. Lifelines parent company, International Stem Cell Corporation, extracts human growth factors from stem cells by stimulating unfertilized eggs. Its the growth factors which stimulate cell growth, differentiation, healing, and proliferation that end up bottled, not the whole stem cells.

There really isn't any concrete, unbiased research to support the use of epidermal growth factors (EGF).

I asked Stephen Alain Ko, cosmetic chemist and blogger at kindofstephen, whether applying growth factors to skin makes sense. He wrote via email, [t]here really isn't any concrete, unbiased research to support the use of epidermal growth factors (EGF) on healthy human skin, and there is also a concern that EGF can also be involved in certain cancer growth as well. Ko noted that Oprah-recommended SkinMedicas TNS Essential Serum ($281 for one ounce) faces a California class action lawsuit claiming the company failed to disclose cancer risks associated with applying human growth factors to skin.

When asked about Skinmedicas TNS Essential Serum, Dobos wrote, [a]t $281 for one ounce and questionable science backing the ingredient claims, I would opt for a less expensive skin care product. Skincare companies dont need to make extravagant claims about the power of stem cell-derived ingredients, or even use whole human stem cells in their products; simply mentioning stem cell taps into long-held beliefs about the power of wearing and consuming human cells and our wallets.

Link:
Would You Slather Blood and Breast Milk on Your Face? - Racked

Skin Stem Cells Comments Off on Would You Slather Blood and Breast Milk on Your Face? – Racked | March 14th, 2017

Ottawa Citizen

'Butterfly Boy' steels himself for second stem-cell transplant Ottawa Citizen Bracing for his second stem-cell transplant in seven months, Jonathan Pitre knows all too well the mountain in front of him, its hardships and precipices. So he's doing ... Pitre will face the transplant alongside his mother, Tina Boileau, who will ... and more »

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'Butterfly Boy' steels himself for second stem-cell transplant - Ottawa Citizen

Skin Stem Cells Comments Off on ‘Butterfly Boy’ steels himself for second stem-cell transplant – Ottawa Citizen | March 12th, 2017

New Delhi [India]: Bura na mano holi hai., said Reena and ran away smearing a fistful of artificial colours on her sisters face.

Reena could have never imagined the after-effect this little prank would have on her sisters skin.

The festival of Holi can be a nightmare for people who are allergic to colours. While a couple of measures can be taken beforehand to prevent the skin from any damage, artificial colours can be nasty and can take time to leave your skin.

While a few like to protect themselves from the harsh colours and chemicals, fewer still, pay any heed to the potential skin damage before setting out to have fun.

Most of the inorganic colours have harmful chemicals that can cause allergies, reddening of the skin and burning sensation. Therefore, in order to usher in the festival of colours with pomp and celebration, it is essential to make sure that your skin comes out of the colour explosion perfectly fine.

Instead of scrubbing too much soap or heading to a beauty salon to get rid of the stubborn colours, this Holi, try your hand at Dead Sea Minerals that are high on magnesium, sodium and potassium, says Manisha Chopra, Co-Founder, SeaSoul Cosmeceuticals.

Dead Sea salts can act as an effective exfoliating agent and cleanser. To remove the stubborn colours, try out the dead sea facial mud mask that is loaded with essential ingredients such as Moroccan Argan oil, plant stem cells, noni fruit, goji berries, dead sea minerals, squalane, Aloe Vera, grape seed oil, sodium hyaluronate and Glycerin.

They dramatically help to clear the skin of all impurities and give a transformative effect on the face. Dead Sea Minerals help to get rid of the nasty colours and let you gain back smooth and healthy skin.

The products infused with Dead Sea salts are gentle and safe for all skin types as they are free of parabens and sulphates. Several medical journals have long exalted Dead Sea muds ability to promote radiance as well as its other therapeutic benefits for chronic skin conditions.

A facial polish works amazingly to get rid of the Holi colour as it removes the dead skin which has colours & then polishes the skin & cleanses the skin removing off the Holi colours. After removal of the colour, apply Dead Sea mud mask.

After removing the mask, apply Vitamin C serum to save your skin from after effects of Holi colours.

According to researchers, the Dead Sea water consists of 32% salts with a relatively high concentration of 21 minerals such as magnesium, calcium, bromide and potassium. The calcium present in the Dead Sea salt helps to cleanse pores and soothes and relieves the skin cells.

Magnesium works as an anti-allergic agent and boosts the metabolism of cells. The bromide present in the salt heals and relieves skin disorders and acts as an anti-inflammatory agent.

Sodium Chloride nourishes and hydrates skin cells and removes toxic waste, improving its permeability. Zinc promotes the natural regulation of cell growth and regeneration. It also aids in cell renewal and stimulates collagen and renews skin.

A great antioxidant, this mineral is a free-radical scavenger. It also improves anti-acne properties, anti-inflammatory properties and is a natural UV-rays blocker.

Thus, this Holi, steer clear of any rashes or breakouts on your skin as a result of stubborn colours and opt for miraculous Dead Sea products and play Holi stress-free.

Dead Sea salts can be found in facial care products such as cleansers, toners, moisturizers and masks. Avail the benefits of the wonderful minerals present in the Dead Sea and get ready to celebrate Holi to the fullest. (ANI)

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This Holi, let your skin soak in benefits of Dead Sea Minerals - The Siasat Daily

Skin Stem Cells Comments Off on This Holi, let your skin soak in benefits of Dead Sea Minerals – The Siasat Daily | March 12th, 2017

Science Daily

Targeting cancer stem cells improves treatment effectiveness, prevents metastasis Science Daily ... Targeting cancer stem cells may be a more effective way to overcome cancer resistance and prevent the spread of squamous cell carcinoma the most common head and neck cancer and the second-most common skin cancer, according to a new study. Ascorbic Acid: New Potential In Targeting Cancer Stem CellsScience Times all 16 news articles »

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Targeting cancer stem cells improves treatment effectiveness, prevents metastasis - Science Daily

Skin Stem Cells Comments Off on Targeting cancer stem cells improves treatment effectiveness, prevents metastasis – Science Daily | March 11th, 2017

Targeting cancer stem cells may be a more effective way to overcome cancer resistance and prevent the spread of squamous cell carcinoma the most common head and neck cancer and the second-most common skin cancer, according to a new study by cancer researchers at the UCLA School of Dentistry.

Head and neck squamous cell carcinoma is a highly invasive form of cancer and frequently spreads to the cervical lymph nodes. Currently, cisplatin is the standard therapeutic drug used for people with HNSCC. Yet, more than 50 percent of people who take cisplatin demonstrate resistance to the drug, and they experience a recurrence of the cancer. The five-year survival rates remain sorely low and researchers still dont understand the underlying mechanisms behind head and neck squamous carcinoma. Therefore, said UCLA cancer biologist Dr. Cun-Yu Wang, who led the study, theres an urgent need to understand why people with this type of cancer are resistant to therapy and to develop new approaches for treating it.

Wangs researchis published online today in the peer-reviewed journal Cell Stem Cell.

Cancer stem cells are known to be responsible for tumor formation and development; they also self-renew and tend to be unresponsive to cancer therapy. These cells have been found in head and neck squamous cell carcinoma. Given the unique challenges that cancer stem cells pose for oncologists, it remains unclear what the optimal therapeutic strategy is for treating HNSCC.

To address this, Wang, who holds the Dr. No-Hee Park Endowed Chair in Dentistry at UCLA and holds a joint appointment in the UCLA Department of Bioengineering, and his research team first developed a mouse model of head and neck squamous cell carcinoma that allowed them to identity the rare cancer stem cells present in HNSCC usingin vivolineage tracing, a method to identify all progeny of a single cell in tissues.

The researchers found that the cancer stem cells expressed the stem cell protein Bmi1 and had increased activator protein-1, known as AP-1, a transcription factor that controls the expression of multiple cancer-associated genes. Based on these new findings, the UCLA team developed and compared different therapeutic strategies for treating head and neck squamous cell carcinoma. They found that a combination of targeting cancer stem cells and killing the tumor mass, consisting of high proliferating cells, with chemotherapy drugs resulted in better outcomes.

The team further discovered that cancer stem cells were not only responsible for squamous cell carcinoma development, but that they also cause cervical lymph node metastasis.

This study shows that for the first time, targeting the proliferating tumor mass and dormant cancer stem cells with combination therapy effectively inhibited tumor growth and prevented metastasis compared to monotherapy in mice, said Wang, who is a member of the UCLA Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center and of the Eli and Edythe Broad Center of Regenerative Medicine and Stem Cell Research at UCLA. Our discovery could be applied to other solid tumors such as breast and colon cancer, which also frequently metastasizes to lymph nodes or distant organs.

With this new and exciting study, Dr. Wang and his team have provided the building blocks for understanding the cellular and genetic mechanisms behind squamous cell carcinoma, said Dr. Paul Krebsbach, dean of the UCLA School of Dentistry. The work has important translational values. Small molecule inhibitors for cancer stem cells in this study are available or being utilized in clinical trials for other diseases. It will be interesting to conduct a clinical trial to test these inhibitors for head and neck squamous cell carcinoma.

Additional authors of the study include Demeng Cheng, first author and postdoctoral scholar in Wangs lab; Mansi Wu, Yang Li, Dr. Insoon Chang, Yuan Quan, Mari Salvo, Peng Deng, Dr. Bo Yu, Yongxin Yu, Jiaqiang Dong, John M. Szymanski, Sivakumar Ramadoss and Jiong Li who are all from the laboratory of molecular signaling in the division of oral biology and medicine at the UCLA School of Dentistry.

This work was supported in part by the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research grants R37DE13848, R01DE15964 and R01DE043110.

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Targeting cancer stem cells improves treatment effectiveness and prevents metastasis - HealthCanal.com (press release) (blog)

Skin Stem Cells Comments Off on Targeting cancer stem cells improves treatment effectiveness and prevents metastasis – HealthCanal.com (press release) (blog) | March 10th, 2017

The skin cells of four adults with schizophrenia have provided an unprecedented window into how the disease began while they were still in the womb, according to a recent paper in Schizophrenia Research.

The paper was publishedby researchers at the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences at the University at Buffalo in collaboration with the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. It provides what the authors call the first proof of concept for their hypothesis that a common genomic pathway lies at the root of schizophrenia.

The researchers say the work is a first step toward the design of treatments that could be administered to pregnant mothers at high risk for bearing a child with schizophrenia, potentially preventing the disease before it begins.

The authors gained insight into the early brain pathology of schizophrenia by using skin cells from four adults with schizophrenia and four adults without the disease that were reprogrammed back into induced pluripotent stem cells and then into neuronal progenitor cells.

The next step in the research is to use these induced pluripotent stem cells to further study how the genome becomes dysregulated, allowing the disease to develop.

The GLP aggregated and excerpted this blog/article to reflect the diversity of news, opinion, and analysis. Read full, original post: Faulty genomic pathway linked to schizophrenia developing in utero, study finds

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Skin cells of schizophrenia patients reveal faulty genetic pathway that began in womb - Genetic Literacy Project

Skin Stem Cells Comments Off on Skin cells of schizophrenia patients reveal faulty genetic pathway that began in womb – Genetic Literacy Project | March 7th, 2017

International Stem Cell Corporation Announces Third Patient with Parkinson's Disease in Phase I Clinical Trial P&T Community 28, 2017 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- International Stem Cell Corporation (OTCQB:ISCO), a California-based clinical stage biotechnology company developing stem cell-based therapies and biomedical products, today announced the third patient in the clinical trial ... and more »

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International Stem Cell Corporation Announces Third Patient with Parkinson's Disease in Phase I Clinical Trial - P&T Community

Skin Stem Cells Comments Off on International Stem Cell Corporation Announces Third Patient with Parkinson’s Disease in Phase I Clinical Trial – P&T Community | March 6th, 2017

By Andy Coghlan

Sarah Harrison and Gaelle Recher, Zernicka-Goetz Lab, University of Cambridge

Artificial mouse embryos grown from stem cells in a dish could help unlock secrets of early development and infertility that have until now evaded us.

Magdalena Zernicka-Goetz at the University of Cambridge and her team made the embryos using embryonic stem cells, the type of cells found in embryos that can mature into any type of tissue in the body.

The trick was to grow these alongside trophoblast stem cells, which normally produce the placenta. By growing these two types of cell separately and then combining them in a special gel matrix, the two mixed and started to develop together.

After around four-and-a-half days, the embryos resembled normal mouse embryos that were about to start differentiating into different body tissues and organs.

They are very similar to natural mouse embryos, says Zernicka-Goetz. We put the two types of stem cells together which has never been done before to allow them to speak to each other. We saw that the cells could self-organise themselves without our help.

This is the first time something resembling an embryo has been made from stem cells, without using an egg in some way. Techniques such as cloning, as done for Dolly the sheep and other animals, bypass the need for sperm, but still require an egg cell.

The artificial embryos are providing new insights into how embryos organise themselves and grow, says Zernicka-Goetz. The team engineered the artificial embryos so the cell types fluoresced in different colours, to reveal their movements and behaviour as the embryos go through crucial changes.

Mammal embryos were already known to start as a symmetrical ball, then elongate, form a central cavity and start developing a type of cell layer called mesoderm, which ultimately goes on to form bone and muscle.

We didnt know before how embryos form this cavity, but weve now found the mechanism for it and the sequential steps by which it forms, says Zernicka-Goetz. Its building up the foundations for the whole body plan.

The work is a great addition to the stem cell field and could be extended to human stem cell populations, says Leonard Zon at Boston Childrens Hospital, Massachusetts. Using the system, the factors that participate in embryo development could be better studied and this could help us understand early events of embryogenesis.

But Robin Lovell-Badge at the Francis Crick Institute in London says that the embryos lack two other types of cell layer required to develop the bodies organs: ectoderm, which forms skin and the central nervous system, and endoderm, which makes our internal organs.

Zernicka-Goetz hopes to see these types of cell layers develop in future experiments by adding stem cells that normally form the yolk sac, a third structure involved in embryonic development, to the mix.

If a similar feat can be achieved using human stem cells, this could tell us much about the earliest stages of our development. Current research is limited by the number of excess embryos that are donated from IVF procedures. But the new technique could produce a limitless supply, making it easier to conduct in-depth research. These artificial embryos may also be easier to tinker with, to see what effect different factors have in early embryogenesis.

Disrupting development in this way may provide new insights into the causes of abnormal embryo development and miscarriage. You would be able to understand the principles that govern each stage of development. These are not normally accessible, because they happen inside the mother, says Zernicka-Goetz.

But it is doubtful that this work could ever lead to fully grown babies in the lab. Lovell-Badge says the artificial embryos are unlikely to develop in vitro much further than shown in the study, as they would soon need the supply of nutrients and oxygen that a placenta normally channels from the mother.

Were not planning to make a mouse in the lab using stem cells, says Zernicka-Goetz. But she is hopeful that adding yolk sac stem cells will allow these artificial embryos to survive long enough to study the beginnings of organs like the heart.

Journal reference: Science, DOI: 10.1126/science.aal1810

Read more: Its time to relax the rules on growing human embryos in the lab

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Artificial embryo grown in a dish from two types of stem cells - New Scientist

Skin Stem Cells Comments Off on Artificial embryo grown in a dish from two types of stem cells – New Scientist | March 2nd, 2017

The skin cells of four adults with schizophrenia provide a unique insight into how the disease began before they were born.

Scientists call the findings the first proof of concept for the hypothesis that a common genomic pathway lies at the root of schizophrenia. They add the work is a step toward the design of treatments that could be administered to pregnant mothers at high risk for bearing a child with schizophrenia, potentially preventing the disease before it begins.

Michal K. Stachowiak, professor of pathology and anatomical sciences at the University at Buffalo, says:

In the last 10 years, genetic investigations into schizophrenia have been plagued by an ever-increasing number of mutations found in patients with the disease. We show for the first time that there is, indeed, a common, dysregulated gene pathway at work here.

The authors used skin cells from four adults with schizophrenia and four adults without the disease. The cells were reprogrammed back into induced pluripotent stem cells and then into neuronal progenitor cells.

By studying induced pluripotent stem cells developed from different patients, we recreated the process that takes place during early brain development in utero, thus obtaining an unprecedented view of how this disease develops, said Stachowiak. This work gives us an unprecedented insight into those processes.

Stachowiak says the research is a proof of concept for a hypothesis he and colleagues published in 2013 that proposed that a single genomic pathway, called the Integrative Nuclear FGFR 1 Signaling (INFS), is a central intersection point for multiple pathways involving more than 100 genes believed to be involved in schizophrenia.

This research shows that there is a common dysregulated gene program that may be impacting more than 1,000 genes and that the great majority of those genes are targeted by the dysregulated nuclear FGFR1, Stachowiak says.

When even one of the many schizophrenia-linked genes undergoes mutation, by affecting the INFS it throws off the development of the brain as a whole, similar to the way that an entire orchestra can be affected by a musician playing just one wrong note, he says.

The next step in the research is to use these induced pluripotent stem cells to further study how the genome becomes dysregulated, allowing the disease to develop.

We will utilize this strategy to grow cerebral organoidsmini-brains in a senseto determine how this genomic dysregulation affects early brain development and to test potential preventive or corrective treatments.

The work was funded by NYSTEM, the Patrick P. Lee Foundation, the National Science Foundation, and the National Institutes of Health.

Image: Views of a Foetus in the Womb (c. 1510 1512) by Leonardo da Vinci

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Schizophrenia May Begin In The Womb, Skin Cells Suggest - ReliaWire

Skin Stem Cells Comments Off on Schizophrenia May Begin In The Womb, Skin Cells Suggest – ReliaWire | March 1st, 2017

Researchers at the Universit libre de Bruxelles, ULB define for the first time the changes in the stem cell dynamics that contribute to wound healing.

One of the key questions in biology is to identify how tissues are repaired after trauma and understand how stem cells migrate, proliferate, and differentiate to repair tissue damage.

In a study published in Nature Communications, researchers lead by Pr. Cdric Blanpain, MD/PhD, WELBIO investigator, and Professor at the Universit libre de Bruxelles, Belgium, defined the cellular and molecular mechanisms that regulate wound healing in the skin.

The skin is the first barrier protecting the animals against the external environment. When the skin barrier is disrupted, a cascade of cellular and molecular events is activated to repair the damage and restore skin integrity. Defects in these events can lead to improper repair causing acute and chronic wound disorders. In the skin, distinct stem cells populations contribute to wound healing. However, it remains unclear how these different stem cells populations balance proliferation, differentiation and migration during the healing process.

In this new study published in Nature Communications, Mariaceleste Aragona, Sophie Dekoninck and colleagues define the clonal dynamics and the molecular mechanisms that lead to tissue repair in the skin epidermis. They used state of the art genetic mouse models to study different stem cells populations. Specifically, they use a technique called lineage tracing to mark stem cells and follow the fate of their progeny over time. Interestingly, they found that stem cells coming from different epidermal compartments present very similar response during wound repair, despite the fact that they are recruited from different regions of the epidermis. It was particularly exciting to observe that the repair of the skin epidermis involves the activation of very different stem cells that react the same way to the emergency situation of the wound and have the power to completely restore the damaged tissue, comments Mariaceleste Aragona, the first author of the study. The authors defined the gene signature of the different regions surrounding the wound to uncover the gene expression signature of the cells that actively divide and those that migrate to repair the wound. The molecular characterization of the migrating leading edge suggests that these cells are protecting the stem cells from the infection and mechanical stress allowing a harmonious healing process, comments Sophie Dekoninck, the co-first author of the study.

Altogether, this study provides important insights into the changes in the mechanisms that lead to tissue repair, and demonstrates that the capacity of the stem cells to regenerate a tissue does not depend on their cellular origin but rather on their proliferation capacity.

This new study uncovers for the first time the dynamic of stem cells during wound healing and identifies new molecular players associated with skin regeneration. The deregulation of several of these genes in patients with chronic ulcers, suggest that defects in the formation and/or function of these two different structures may induce defect of wound-healing leading to chronic ulcer formation. Further functional studies will be needed to define the role of these genes and to identify new therapeutic targets to treat chronic wound disorders that cost each year billions of dollars, explains Cdric Blanpain, the senior and corresponding author of this new study.

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Materials provided by Libre de Bruxelles, Universit. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.

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Wound healing: The stem cell dynamic - Science Daily

Skin Stem Cells Comments Off on Wound healing: The stem cell dynamic – Science Daily | March 1st, 2017

The skin cells of four adults with schizophrenia provide an unprecedented window into how the disease began before they were born.

Scientists call the findings the first proof of concept for the hypothesis that a common genomic pathway lies at the root of schizophreniaand say the work is a step toward the design of treatments that could be administered to pregnant mothers at high risk for bearing a child with schizophrenia, potentially preventing the disease before it begins.

We show for the first time that there is, indeed, a common, dysregulated gene pathway at work here.

In the last 10 years, genetic investigations into schizophrenia have been plagued by an ever-increasing number of mutations found in patients with the disease, says Michal K. Stachowiak, professor of pathology and anatomical sciences at the University at Buffalo. We show for the first time that there is, indeed, a common, dysregulated gene pathway at work here.

The authors gained insight into the early brain pathology of schizophrenia by using skin cells from four adults with schizophrenia and four adults without the disease. The cells were reprogrammed back into induced pluripotent stem cells and then into neuronal progenitor cells.

By studying induced pluripotent stem cells developed from different patients, we recreated the process that takes place during early brain development in utero, thus obtaining an unprecedented view of how this disease develops, said Stachowiak. This work gives us an unprecedented insight into those processes.

Stachowiak says the research, published in Schizophrenia Research, is a proof of concept for a hypothesis he and colleagues published in 2013 that proposed that a single genomic pathway, called the Integrative Nuclear FGFR 1 Signaling (INFS), is a central intersection point for multiple pathways involving more than 100 genes believed to be involved in schizophrenia.

This research shows that there is a common dysregulated gene program that may be impacting more than 1,000 genes and that the great majority of those genes are targeted by the dysregulated nuclear FGFR1, Stachowiak says.

When even one of the many schizophrenia-linked genes undergoes mutation, by affecting the INFS it throws off the development of the brain as a whole, similar to the way that an entire orchestra can be affected by a musician playing just one wrong note, he says.

The next step in the research is to use these induced pluripotent stem cells to further study how the genome becomes dysregulated, allowing the disease to develop.

We will utilize this strategy to grow cerebral organoidsmini-brains in a senseto determine how this genomic dysregulation affects early brain development and to test potential preventive or corrective treatments.

Other researchers from University at Buffalo and the Icahn School of Medicine at Mt. Sinai are coauthors of the work, which was funded by NYSTEM, the Patrick P. Lee Foundation, the National Science Foundation, and the National Institutes of Health.

Source: University at Buffalo

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Skin cells suggest schizophrenia may start in the womb - Futurity - Futurity: Research News

Skin Stem Cells Comments Off on Skin cells suggest schizophrenia may start in the womb – Futurity – Futurity: Research News | March 1st, 2017

By Jacob Dykes

In Durham, a pioneering technology has been developed which is providing a solution to fundamental issues in tissue engineering and stem cell biology. The development of new innovative technology enables the advancement of the research and discovery process and scientific thinking as a whole. For example, its hard to conceive of a biomedical sphere untouched by the blessing of PCR or DNA sequencing. Technological advancements not only offer solutions to existing obstacles, they open up new avenues of research into previously inconceivable areas.

With the current levels of excitement in the research of stem cell biology, you could be forgiven for envisaging a utopian medical scenario where a process akin to science-fiction allows us to generate complex tissues in a Petri-dish, ready for transplantation into the damaged organism. The scientific community has speculated that the nature of stem cells, in their ability to self-renew and produce cell types of any lineage will eventually provide medical solutions to some of our most vilified tissue diseases.

Transitioning speculation to reality requires time, basic research and technology development. A novel product known as Alvetex has been developed by Reinnervate, a Durham University spin-out company, which enables a new routine approach to study stem cells and their ability to form tissues in the laboratory. The product unlocks the potential of stem cell differentiation by mimicking the natural three-dimensional (3D) microenvironment cells encounter in the body, enabling the formation of 3D tissue-like structures.

Cell behaviour, in general, is guided by the complex 3D microenvironment in which they reside. Dispersal of cell-cell interactions and architectural contacts across the surface of the cell are essential for regulating gene expression, the genetic mechanism by which cells change their character and behaviour. Recreation of this microenvironment in the laboratory is essential to studying physiologically relevant behaviour, and the differentiation process by which cells form new cell types. Alvetex is a micro-engineered 3D polystyrene scaffold into which cells can be impregnated for cultivation. Cells grow within a 200-micron thick membrane of the 3D material bathed in culture medium. The microenvironment enables cells to form 3D contacts with neighbouring cells, recreating the more natural interactions found in real tissues. Overall, this affects the structure and function of the cells, enabling them to behave more like their native counterparts, which in turn improves predictive accuracy when working with advanced cell culture models.

We can take progenitor cells from the skin of donors and produce human skin We can take cell lines from the intestine and reproduce the absorptive lining of the intestine. We can take neural progenitors and recapitulate 3D neural networks.

Stefan Przyborski is a Professor of Cell Technology at Durham University and the founder of Reinnervate. He gave us an insight into his technologys applications;

We can take progenitor cells from the skin of donors and produce a full-thickness stratified human skin model (see image). We can take cell lines from the intestine and reproduce the absorptive lining of the intestine. We can take neural progenitors and recapitulate 3D neural networks to simulate aspects of nervous system function. Each of these models can be used to advance basic research, and extend our understanding of tissue development, and simulate aspects of disease.

Such technology is underpinned by well established fundamental principles such as how cellular structure is related to function, which hails way back to Da Vinci himself. It is well known that if you get the structure and the anatomy correct than the physiology will start to follow.

Alvetex technology has already been used in research that has led the publication of over 60 research papers in the field of tissue engineering and cancer biology. One particular group used the technology to successfully test drugs to prevent glioblastoma dispersal, an innovative application in brain oncology. Another has developed a 3D skin model to better study the development of metastatic melanoma, a persistently incurable invasive tumour of the skin. US scientists have used Alvetex on the International Space Station to study the formation of bone tissue in microgravity conditions.

The technology promises to be a cost-effective and ethical solution to current obstacles in cell culturing methods, producing better quality data relevant to man and reducing the need for animal models. Alvetex technology has offered a generational contribution to the process of tissue engineering research, yet the founder has higher ambitions;

What I would like to see in the next few decades is the increased complexity of the tissues that stem cells can be used to generate. If you consider the structure of an organ, the complexity, arrangement and structural organisation of those cell populations, it is far from where we are today. Advances in technology at the interface between disciplines leads to new innovative ideas to solve problems and open up new opportunities.

The development of stem cell research is an incremental process. We have to remain cautious given the potential of stem cell therapy to cause tumour formation, highlighting the need for more stringent models and controls. However, the clinical transplantation of cultured stem cells in bone and cornea repair demonstrates their enormous potential. Laboratory experiments have also demonstrated the potential of stem cells to produce kidney, pancreatic, liver, cardiac and muscle cells. It is hoped that continued research using more physiologically relevant technologies will increase the complexity of these tissues in the lab, and the diversity of their application.

Innovative technological advances play an important role in the process of biomedical science. Scientists at Durham are instrumental in the development of such new technologies that enable the process of new discoveries.

Photograph: Prof Stefan Przyborski, Durham University

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Durham scientists pioneer innovative stem cell research - Palatinate

Skin Stem Cells Comments Off on Durham scientists pioneer innovative stem cell research – Palatinate | February 25th, 2017

Call me a creature of habit, or just plain boring, but Ive been wearing my hair long, blonde, straight, and side-parted for more than 15 years. The only thing thats really changed is how much of it I have left. Whether the result of bleach, blowouts, stress, hormones, genetics, or all of the above, Ive been shedding like a cheap angora sweater since the age of 30. And, to make matters worse, the hair I do have is fine, fragile, and flyaway.

It wasnt always so. Flipping through old photo albums, I found evidence not only of my natural color (a long-forgotten brown) but also of the graphic, blunt bob I sported in my early 20s. I had oodles of hair back then and would smooth it to my head with pomade and push it behind my earsmuch like Guido Palau did on some of the models in Pradas spring runway show, I noted smugly.

Efforts in the ensuing years to save my ever-sparser strands have been all but futile. You name it, Ive tried it: platelet-rich plasma (PRP), treatments in which your own blood is spun down to platelets and injected into your scalp; mesotherapy (painful vitamin shots, also in the scalp); oral supplements; acupuncture; massage; herbal remedies; and high-tech hair products. Ive even resorted to wearing a silly-looking helmet that bathed my head in low-level laser light and was said to stimulate failing follicles. At this point, I would soak my mane in mares milk under the glow of a waxing supermoon if I thought it would help.

Since hair regeneration is one of the cosmetics-research worlds holiest grails (read: potential multibillion-dollar industry), Ive always hoped that a bona fide breakthrough was around the corner, and prayed it would arrive well ahead of my dotage. As it turns out, it might actually be a five-hour flight from New Yorkand around $10,000away.

It was the celebrity hairstylist Sally Hershberger who whispered the name Roberta F. Shapiro into my ear. You have to call her, she said. She is on to something, and it could be big. Shapiro, a well-respected Manhattan pain-management specialist, treats mostly chronic and acute musculoskeletal and myofascial conditions, like disc disease and degeneration, pinched nerves, meniscal tears, and postLyme disease pain syndromes. Her patient list reads like a whos who of the citys power (and pain-afflicted) elite, and her practice is so busy, she could barely find time to speak with me. According to Shapiro, a possible cure for hair loss was never on her agenda.

But thats exactly what she thinks she may have stumbled upon in the course of her work with stem cell therapy. About eight years ago, she started noticing a commonality among many of her patientsevidence of autoimmune disease with inflammatory components. Frustrated that she was merely palliating their discomfort and not addressing the underlying problems, Shapiro began to look beyond traditional treatments and drug protocols to the potential healing and regenerative benefits of stem cellsspecifically, umbilical cordderived mesenchymal stem cells, which, despite being different from the controversial embryonic stem cells, are used in the U.S. only for research purposes. After extensive vetting, she began bringing patients to the Stem Cell Institute, in Panama City, Panama, which she considers the most sophisticated, safe, and aboveboard facility of its kind. Its not a spa, or a feel-good, instant-fix kind of place, nor is it one of those bogus medical-tourism spots, she says. Lori Kanter Tritsch, a 55-year-old New York architect (and the longtime partner of Este Lauder Executive Chairman William Lauder) is a believer. She accompanied Shapiro to Panama for relief from what had become debilitating neck pain caused by disc bulges and stenosis from arthritis, and agreed to participate in this story only because she believes in the importance of a wider conversation about stem cells. If it works for hair rejuvenation, or other cosmetic purposes, great, but that was not at all my primary goal in having the treatment, Kanter Tritsch said.

While at the Stem Cell Institute, Kanter Tritsch had around 100 million stem cells administered intravenously (a five-minute process) and six intramuscular injections of umbilical cord stem cellderived growth factor (not to be confused with growth hormone, which has been linked to cancer). In the next three months, she experienced increased mobility in her neck, was able to walk better, and could sleep through the night. She also lost a substantial amount of weight (possibly due to the anti-inflammatory effect of the stem cells), and her skin looked great. Not to mention, her previously thinning hair nearly doubled in volume.

As Shapiro explains it, the process of hair loss is twofold. The first factor is decreased blood supply to hair follicles, or ischemia, which causes a slow decrease in their function. This can come from aging, genetics, or autoimmune disease. The second is inflammation. One of the reasons I think mesenchymal stem cells are working to regenerate hair is that stem cell infiltration causes angiogenesis, which is a fancy name for regrowing blood vessels, or in this case, revascularizing the hair follicles, Shapiro notes. Beyond that, she says, the cells have a very strong anti-inflammatory effect.

For clinical studies shes conducting in Panama, Shapiro will employ her proprietary technique of microfracturing, or injecting the stem cells directly into the scalp. She thinks this unique delivery method will set her procedure apart. But, she cautions, this is a growing science, and we are only at the very beginning. PRP is like bathwater compared with amniotic- or placenta-derived growth factor, or better yet, umbilical cordderived stem cells.

Realizing that not everyone has the money or inclination to fly to Panama for a treatment that might not live up to their expectations, Hershberger and Shapiro are in the process of developing Platinum Clinical, a line of hair products containing growth factor harvested from amniotic fluid and placenta. (Shapiro stresses that these are donated remnants of a live birth that would otherwise be discarded.) The products will be available later this year at Hershbergers salons.

With follicular salvation potentially within reach, I wondered if it might be time to revisit the blunt bob of my youth. I call Palau, and inquire about that sleek 1920s do he created for Prada. Fine hair can actually work better for a style like this, he says. In fact, designers often prefer models with fine hair, so the hairstyle doesnt overpower the clothing. Then he confides, Sometimes, if a girl has too much hair, we secretly braid it away. Say what? I know, its the exact opposite of what women want in the real world. But models are starting to realize that fine hair can be an asset. Look, at some point you have to embrace what you have and work with it. Wise words, perhaps, and proof that, like pretty much everything else, thick hair is wasted on the young.

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Thanks to Stem Cell Therapy, Thinning Hair May Be a Thing of the Past - W Magazine

Skin Stem Cells Comments Off on Thanks to Stem Cell Therapy, Thinning Hair May Be a Thing of the Past – W Magazine | February 23rd, 2017