Red region in this 9 day old mouse embryo shows embryonic stem cells (ESC) within the extra-embryonic yolk sac, a tissue type that ESC usually can't form.  (Photo Credit: Sophie Morgani, University of Copenhagen.)It is all about potency. And no, that is not a male boasting about the power of sperm. It is about the … Continue reading Study may lead to fewer miscarriages

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. Atomic bomb fallout settles brain dispute. Can the neural stem cells in adult brains create new neurons, or not? That question has created a long-running dispute … Continue reading Stem cell Stories that caught our eye: new nerves in aging brains, federal regulation and earthworms.

You can’t say “it ain’t rocket science” about stem cell research.Getting any one of our CIRM funded projects to clinical trials will be based on years of intelligent, dedicated research by scores of scientists supported by the funding needed to do the work (see our progress on therapies here). But you could argue that reaching … Continue reading New Video: Alpha Stem Cell Clinics – A New Way to Deliver Medicine

Canary image: Wikimedia CommonsA team at the University of Rochester has succeeded in getting the brain’s native stem cells to replace the nerve cells lost in Huntington’s disease. Their work, published today in Cell Stem Cell dramatically extended the lives of their first set of patients—mice. But they have since replicated the work in monkeys, … Continue reading A birdbrain path to potential Huntington’s Disease therapy

A very simplified illustration of chromosomal DNA looping. This remodeling of the chromosome is essential for turning genes on and off (adapted from Kevin Song, Wikimedia Commons)Shinya Yamanaka’s 2012 Nobel Prize-winning technique of reprogramming adult cells such as skin, into embryonic stem cell-like induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSC) was a real breakthrough in the field. … Continue reading Staying in the Loop: Chromosome Loops Required for Cellular Reprogramming

The French love their cafes. The English love their pubs. In both cases they are often more than just a place to get a refreshing libation, they’re also a place to get stimulating conversation. Philosophy, politics, religion, sports; they’re all hot topics in those places.In the US we are creating our own version of those … Continue reading Hot science, cold beer, spicy food; the perfect combination

The online life sciences news site Mendelspod recently posted a piece titled: UCSC Up To More than Bioinformatics. Well, we knew that of course. CIRM has awarded researchers there more than $28 million in grants, including $7 million toward their new stem cell research building. One of those awards funds a very cool project adapting … Continue reading UCSC stem cell scientists examine aging

The National Institutes of Health has released a fact sheet about the effects of sequestration on the agency. The 5 percent cut will result in a loss of $1.55 billion during the 2013 fiscal year.They write:Medical breakthroughs do not happen overnight. In almost all instances, breakthrough discoveries result from years of incremental research to understand … Continue reading NIH sequestration fact sheet: "delaying progress in medical breakthroughs"

The National Institutes of Health has released a fact sheet about the effects of sequestration on the agency. The 5 percent cut will result in a loss of $1.55 billion during the 2013 fiscal year.They write:Medical breakthroughs do not happen overnight. In almost all instances, breakthrough discoveries result from years of incremental research to understand … Continue reading NIH sequestration fact sheet: “delaying progress in medical breakthroughs”

Nature ran an interesting story today on access to the new stem cell lines created last month through cloning. The technique involves removing the DNA from an egg, inserting the DNA from an adult cell (like skin or blood), then triggering the egg to start dividing. The end result is a 4-5 day old embryo … Continue reading Embryonic stem cell lines through cloning valuable, but access is limited