Today we bring you a guest blog from Athena Mari Asklipiadis. She's the founder of Mixed Marrow, which is an organization dedicated to finding bone marrow and blood cell donors to patients of multiethnic descent. Athena helped produce a 2016 documentary film called Mixed Match that encourages mixed race and minority donors to register as adult donors. Due to … Continue reading Mixed Matches: How Your Heritage Can Save a Life
Month: March 2017
Three people left blind by Florida clinic’s unproven stem cell therapy
The report makes for chilling reading. Three women, all suffering from macular degeneration – the leading cause of vision loss in the US – went to a Florida clinic hoping that a stem cell therapy would save their eyesight. Instead, it caused all three to go blind. The study, in the latest issue of the … Continue reading Three people left blind by Florida clinic’s unproven stem cell therapy
A horse, stem cells and an inspiring comeback story that may revolutionize tendon repair
Everyone loves a good comeback story. Probably because it leaves us feeling inspired and full of hope. But the comeback story about a horse named Dream Alliance may do more than that: his experience promises to help people with Achilles tendon injuries get fully healed and back on their feet more quickly. Dream Alliance was … Continue reading A horse, stem cells and an inspiring comeback story that may revolutionize tendon repair
Building the World’s Largest iPSC Repository: An Interview with CIRM’s Stephen Lin
This blog originally appeared on RegMedNet and was provided by Freya Leask, Editor & Community Manager of RegMedNet. In this interview, Stephen Lin, Senior Science Officer at the California Institute Regenerative Medicine (CIRM), discusses the scope, challenges and potential of CIRM’s iPSC Initiative. Stephen Lin received his PhD from Washington University (MO, USA) and completed his postdoctoral … Continue reading Building the World’s Largest iPSC Repository: An Interview with CIRM’s Stephen Lin
Stem Cell Stories That Caught Our Eye: Three new ways to target cancer stem cells
Here are some stem cell stories that caught our eye this past week. Some are groundbreaking science, others are of personal interest to us, and still others are just fun. Targeting cancer stem cells. This week, three studies came out with novel ways for targeting cancer stem cells in different types of cancers. Here’s a … Continue reading Stem Cell Stories That Caught Our Eye: Three new ways to target cancer stem cells
A Clinical Trial Network Focused on Stem Cell Treatments is Expanding
Geoff Lomax is a Senior Officer of CIRM's Strategic Initiatives. California is one of the world-leaders in advancing stem cell research towards treatments and cures for patients with unmet medical needs. California has scientists at top universities and companies conducting cutting edge research in regenerative medicine. It also has CIRM, California’s Stem Cell Agency, which … Continue reading A Clinical Trial Network Focused on Stem Cell Treatments is Expanding
3D printing blood vessels: a key step to solving the organ donor crisis
About 120,000 people in the U.S. are on a waiting list for an organ donation and every day 22 of those people will die because there aren’t enough available organs. To overcome this organ donor crisis, bioengineers are working hard to develop 3D printing technologies that can construct tissues and organs from scratch by using … Continue reading 3D printing blood vessels: a key step to solving the organ donor crisis
License to heal: UC Davis deal looks to advance stem cell treatment for bone loss and arthritis
There are many challenges in taking even the most promising stem cell treatment and turning it into a commercial product approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). One of the biggest is expertise. The scientists who develop the therapy may be brilliant in the lab but have little experience or expertise in successfully getting … Continue reading License to heal: UC Davis deal looks to advance stem cell treatment for bone loss and arthritis
Could Stem Cells Help Beat Multiple Sclerosis?
March is Multiple Sclerosis month. In honor of MS patients and research, we are featuring a guest blog from scientist and communicator Hamideh Emrani. Thoughts expressed here are not necessarily those of CIRM. If you are reading this post, other than out of curiosity, chances are that you know someone who has been affected by … Continue reading Could Stem Cells Help Beat Multiple Sclerosis?
Stem cell stories that caught our eye: building an embryo and reviving old blood stem cells
Building an embryo in the lab from stem cells The human body has been studied for centuries yet little is known about the first 14 days of human development when the fertilized embryo implants into the mother’s uterus and begins to divide and grow. Being able to precisely examine this critical time window may help … Continue reading Stem cell stories that caught our eye: building an embryo and reviving old blood stem cells