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Other News |
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Articles from the PHG Foundation Newsletter
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Articles from the PHG Foundation Newsletter
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Study to use stem cells from Parkinson's patients
A major new study funded by Parkinson's UK will use induced pluripotent stem (IPS) cells to investigate Parkinson's disease. Parkinson’s is a progressive neurological disorder that affects motor functions, causing slowing of certain movements, postural instability and tremor (involuntary shaki ...
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Legal disputes over adult and embryonic stem cell research
A report from the European Science Foundation (ESF) released last month examines key issues in human stem cell research and regenerative medicine, which it hails as having the promise to be ‘one of the most fascinating and controversial scientific developments of the 21st century’ (see p ...
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Spit tests for bone marrow donor recruitment
Kits to take saliva samples at home and send samples for DNA analysis, already used for selected commercial applications such as paternity testing and genetic disease risk prediction, is being put to new use. A UK charity, the Anthony Nolan Trust, has launched a new system to recruit members of the ...
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New web-based guide to stem cell treatments
The International Society for Stem Cell Research (ISSCR) has a launched a new website for people considering stem cell treatments for different conditions. The ISSCR, whilst promoting basic and clinical stem cell research, has expressed concern in the past about the potential exploitation of patien ...
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Stem cell therapy for mutiple sclerosis: trials and tribulations
The first, small-scale clinical trials of stem cells as a treatment for multiple sclerosis (MS) have reportedly shown promising results (see BBC news report). Six patients were injected with stem cells taken from their own bone marrow. Study leader Prof Neil Scolding of the University of Bristol sai ...
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Support for adult stem cell research
Switzerland has announced a major new three-year programme of research in stem cells and regenerative medicine. The aim of the NRP 63 programme, which is to receive CHF 10 million (£3.6 million; €4.2 million) from the Swiss National Fund, is to ‘better understand how stem cells work ...
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Progress in regenerative medicine: growing tissues
Regenerative medicine is a fast-moving interdisciplinary field, combining stem cell therapeutics and tissue engineering with a range of other techniques to repair or replace cells, tissues or organs damaged by accident or disease. Simpler forms of tissue for transplantation grown from a patient&rsqu ...
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Warnings about unlicensed cord blood collection
The UK Human Tissue Authority (HTA) has issued an official warning that unlawful collections of umbilical cord blood have been taking place in the UK, and that such instances ‘may compromise safety and quality standards’ (see press release). Cord blood banking is growing in popularity ...
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Official definition of human embryonic stem cells widened in US
The official definition of human embryonic stem (HES) cells in US National Institutes of Health (NIH) guidelines is to be broadened from those ‘derived from the inner cell mass of blastocyst stage human embryo’ (ie. from embryos that have reached the blastocyst stage at four or fiv ...
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Improved cord blood transplantation to treat leukaemia
A paper in Nature Medicine has been has been heralded as a major advance for bone marrow transplantation, reporting a new way of manipulating cord blood stem cells to expand their numbers without causing differentiation from stem cells into normal blood cells (which are unsuitable for tran ...
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