Our goal is to develop a cellular strategy for repairing the damage seen in children's myelin disease, Multiple Sclerosis and other neurological diseases.

 
UK stem cell bank will soon be open for deposits.
posted by Canadian Myelin Research Initiative at 11:56 AM

 

Christopher Reeve believes that therapeutic cloning is the most viable way to circumvent the significant challenge of immune rejection in human embryonic stem cell transplant.
posted by Canadian Myelin Research Initiative at 11:53 AM

 
"Although it's a bit unusual to put mouse cells into human heads, there is technically no reason why not," Edwards said.

Although there is no "technical" reason there is not a regulatory branch of government in the UK or anywhere else that would approve clinical trials where mouse cells are transplanted into the human brain. The FDA certainly would not and the Health Protection Branch in Canada would not either.
posted by Canadian Myelin Research Initiative at 10:39 PM

 
Yahoo! News - British Firm Cracks Stem Cell Production Problem
Wed Sep 11, 5:17 AM ET
By Ben Hirschler, European Pharmaceuticals Correspondent

LONDON (Reuters) - A British firm pioneering stem cells as a treatment for brain damage said on Wednesday it believed it had cracked a production problem which has delayed development of the controversial technology.

ReNeuron Holdings Plc, Europe's first listed stem cell company, now expects to start human trials in 2004 -- three years later than originally hoped.

Plans to treat Parkinson's disease ( news - web sites) and stroke by injecting fetal stem cells into patients' brains were put on hold last year following the discovery that cell lines became genetically unstable after being recreated many times.

But the setbacks at ReNeuron highlight the technical difficulties surrounding the use of stem cells -- whether embryonic, foetal or adult -- in "regenerative" medicine.

It will still be many years before an approved treatment is ready for the market.

That leaves ReNeuron, a spin-off from Britain's Institute of Psychiatry, facing a cash crunch. The group had cash reserves of just $13.7 million at the end of March.

"We have enough cash until the end of next calendar year ... we will have to raise money by the middle of next year," Edwards said.

In a bid to fill the gap left by the delay in developing products derived from human foetal material, ReNeuron is also working with mouse cells, initially for the treatment of Huntington's disease, a rare genetic brain disorder.

That work is more advanced and clinical trials could start around the end of 2003, though here, too, the company is courting controversy.

"Although it's a bit unusual to put mouse cells into human heads, there is technically no reason why not," Edwards said.




posted by Canadian Myelin Research Initiative at 12:41 PM

 
In the September issue of Nature Biotechnology, Roger Pedersen, a stem cell researcher at the University of Cambridge states that for a profound understanding of human embryonic stem cells researchers need a better definition of the molecular mechanisms that maintain pluripotency before the derivatives of human ES can be used therapeutically.
posted by Canadian Myelin Research Initiative at 10:52 AM

 
Yahoo! News - Britain Launches Europe's First Stem Cell Bank
Mon Sep 9, 1:55 PM ET

LONDON (Reuters) - Britain launched Europe's first stem cell bank on Monday and said it could be up and running within a year.

The Medical Research Council said the National Institute for Biological Standards and Control (NIBSC) has been appointed to set up the UK Stem Cell Bank which will ensure that there is a single national independent institute responsible for managing and supplying approved stem cell lines for research.
posted by Canadian Myelin Research Initiative at 12:01 AM

 
CNN.com - Adult stem cells a bust? - September 7, 2002

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Adult blood stem cells were unable to transform into other types of tissue cells in a Stanford University study, raising new doubts about the eventual value of the cells in the treatment of disease.

The finding supports the view that embryonic stem cells, not adult stem cells, offer the most promise for treating conditions such as heart disease, spinal injury, diabetes and Parkinson's disease, some researchers say.


posted by Canadian Myelin Research Initiative at 11:50 PM