Students

Why the future of regenerative medicine depends on students getting a living wage

/ Kevin McCormack / 1 Comment

The headline in the journal Nature was intended to grab attention and it definitely did that. It read: ‘The scandal of researchers paid less than a living wage’ The rest of the article built on that saying “The cost-of-living crisis is a fundamental threat for PhD scholars and early-career researchers. They need to be paid properly.”

So, just how poorly are these researchers – PhD candidates and postdoctoral students – paid? Well, according to one survey salaries for PhD students in the biological sciences are below the cost of living at almost every institution in the United States. And imagine trying to live on a sub-standard income in a state as expensive as California?

The outrage is fueled by a survey of more than 3,200 students, three quarters of whom are PhD candidates. Around 85% of the students said inflation is making things even worse and almost half said it was making it hard to complete their courses.

The situation isn’t any better in other countries. In the UK, PhD students often get the equivalent of just $20,400, and that’s after getting a recent big boost of more than $2,000 per year. It’s no wonder English students organized protests calling for better funding. Students in Ireland also staged protests, saying the money they get simply isn’t enough.

The Nature Editorial said this isn’t just a matter of inconvenience for the students, it’s a threat to the future of science: “If students don’t have the resources to support themselves, they can’t put their full efforts into their training and development. And if their stipends aren’t keeping pace with rising rents and the cost of groceries and fuel, any gaps will only grow with time — with devastating results for the ability of research to attract the best talent.”

That’s one of the reasons the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) tries to make sure all the students in its internship programs have enough money to live on. We know it’s hard to focus on work if you are hungry or worried that you don’t have enough money to pay your bills.

When our Board approved a new internship program, called COMPASS (Creating Opportunities through Mentorship and Partnership Across Stem Cell Science) they made sure that enough money was included to cover students living expenses, course fees and even travel to scientific conferences. The Board allocated more than $58,000 a year to support each students, many of whom will come from poor or low-income communities and might not otherwise be able to afford to stay in school.

For our Bridges students, many of whom are also from low-income communities or are the first in their family to attend college, the Board allocated each one around $72,000 worth of support per year.

We know that the future of regenerative medicine in California depends on having a skilled, well-trained, diverse workforce. That doesn’t just mean PhDs doing the research, it also means the technicians and support staff that can help with manufacturing etc. Without a living wage that makes this possible many students will drop out and the field as a whole will struggle. Those most affected will be students from poor backgrounds or from disadvantaged and historically marginalized communities.

We need to support these students in every way we can. If we don’t provide enough financial support for these students to succeed, the field as a whole will be a lot poorer.

Stem Cell Stories That Caught our Eye: Making blood and muscle from stem cells and helping students realize their “pluripotential”

/ Karen Ring / Leave a comment

Stem cells offer new drug for blood diseases. A new treatment for blood disorders might be in the works thanks to a stem cell-based study out of Harvard Medical School and Boston Children’s hospital. Their study was published in the journal Science Translational Medicine.

The teams made induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) from the skin of patients with a rare blood disorder called Diamond-Blackfan anemia (DBA) – a bone marrow disease that prevents new blood cells from forming. iPSCs from DBA patients were then specialized into blood progenitor cells, the precursors to blood cells. However, these precursor cells were incapable of forming red blood cells in a dish like normal precursors do.

Red blood cells were successfully made via induced pluripotent stem cells from a Diamond-Blackfan anemia patient. Image: Daley lab, Boston Children’s

Red blood cells were successfully made via induced pluripotent stem cells from a Diamond-Blackfan anemia patient. Image: Daley lab, Boston Children’s

The blood progenitor cells from DBA patients were then used to screen a library of compounds to identify drugs that could get the DBA progenitor cells to develop into red blood cells. They found a compound called SMER28 that had this very effect on progenitor cells in a dish. When the compound was tested in zebrafish and mouse models of DBA, the researchers observed an increase in red blood cell production and a reduction of anemia symptoms.

Getting pluripotent stem cells like iPSCs to turn into blood progenitor cells and expand these cells into a population large enough for drug screening has not been an easy task for stem cell researchers.

Co-first author on the study, Sergei Doulatov, explained in a press release, “iPS cells have been hard to instruct when it comes to making blood. This is the first time iPS cells have been used to identify a drug to treat a blood disorder.”

In the future, the researchers will pursue the questions of why and how SMER28 boosts red blood cell generation. Further work will be done to determine whether this drug will be a useful treatment for DBA patients and other blood disorders.

 

Students realize their “pluripotential”. In last week’s stem cell stories, I gave a preview about an exciting stem cell “Day of Discovery” hosted by USC Stem Cell in southern California. The event happened this past Saturday. Over 500 local middle and high school students attended the event and participated in lab tours, poster sessions, and a career resource fair. Throughout the day, they were engaged by scientists and educators about stem cell science through interactive games, including the stem cell edition of Family Feud and a stem cell smartphone videogame developed by USC graduate students.

In a USC press release, Rohit Varma, dean of the Keck School of Medicine of USC, emphasized the importance of exposing young students to research and scientific careers.

“It was a true joy to welcome the middle and high school students from our neighboring communities in Boyle Heights, El Sereno, Lincoln Heights, the San Gabriel Valley and throughout Los Angeles. This bright young generation brings tremendous potential to their future pursuits in biotechnology and beyond.”

Maria Elena Kennedy, a consultant to the Bassett Unified School District, added, “The exposure to the Keck School of Medicine of USC is invaluable for the students. Our students come from a Title I School District, and they don’t often have the opportunity to come to a campus like the Keck School of Medicine.”

The day was a huge success with students posting photos of their experiences on social media and enthusiastically writing messages like “stem cells are our future” and “USC is my goal”. One high school student acknowledged the opportunity that this day offers to students, “California currently has biotechnology as the biggest growing sector. Right now, it’s really important that students are visiting labs and learning more about the industry, so they can potentially see where they’re going with their lives and careers.”

You can read more about USC’s Stem Cell Day of Discovery here. Below are a few pictures from the event courtesy of David Sprague and USC.

Students have fun with robots representing osteoblast and osteoclast cells at the Stem Cell Day of Discovery event held at the USC Health Sciences Campus in Los Angeles, CA. February 4th, 2017. The event encourages students to learn more about STEM opportunities, including stem cell study and biotech, and helps demystify the fields and encourage student engagement. Photo by David Sprague

Students have fun with robots representing osteoblast and osteoclast cells at the USC Stem Cell Day of Discovery. Photo by David Sprague

Dr. Francesca Mariana shows off a mouse skeleton that has been dyed to show bones and cartilage at the Stem Cell Day of Discovery event held at the USC Health Sciences Campus in Los Angeles, CA. February 4th, 2017. The event encourages students to learn more about STEM opportunities, including stem cell study and biotech, and helps demystify the fields and encourage student engagement. Photo by David Sprague

Dr. Francesca Mariana shows off a mouse skeleton that has been dyed to show bones and cartilage. Photo by David Sprague

USC masters student Shantae Thornton shows students how cells are held in long term cold storage tanks at -195 celsius at the Stem Cell Day of Discovery event held at the USC Health Sciences Campus in Los Angeles, CA. February 4th, 2017. The event encourages students to learn more about STEM opportunities, including stem cell study and biotech, and helps demystify the fields and encourage student engagement. Photo by David Sprague

USC masters student Shantae Thornton shows students how cells are held in long term cold storage tanks at -195 celsius. Photo by David Sprague

Genesis Archila, left, and Jasmine Archila get their picture taken at the Stem Cell Day of Discovery event held at the USC Health Sciences Campus in Los Angeles, CA. February 4th, 2017. The event encourages students to learn more about STEM opportunities, including stem cell study and biotech, and helps demystify the fields and encourage student engagement. Photo by David Sprague

Genesis Archila, left, and Jasmine Archila get their picture taken at the USC Stem Cell Day of Discovery. Photo by David Sprague

New stem cell recipes for making muscle: new inroads to study muscular dystrophy (Todd Dubnicoff)

Embryonic stem cells are amazing because scientists can change or specialize them into virtually any cell type. But it’s a lot easier said than done. Researchers essentially need to mimic the process of embryo development in a petri dish by adding the right combination of factors to the stem cells in just the right order at just the right time to obtain a desired type of cell.

Making human muscle tissue from embryonic stem cells has proven to be a challenge. The development of muscle, as well as cartilage and bone, are well characterized and known to form from an embryonic structure called a somite. Researches have even been successful working out the conditions for making somites from animal stem cells. But those recipes didn’t work well with human stem cells.

Now, a team of researchers at the Eli and Edythe Broad Center of Regenerative Medicine and Stem Cell Research at UCLA has overcome this roadblock by carrying out a systematic approach using human tissue. As described in Cell Reports, the scientists isolated somites from early human embryos and studied their gene activity. By comparing somites that were just beginning to emerge with fully formed somites, the researchers pinpointed differences in gene activity patterns. With this data in hand, the team added factors to the cells that were known to affect the activity of those genes. Through some trial and error, they produced a recipe – different than those used in animal cells – that could convert 90 percent of the human stem cells into somites in only four days. Those somites could then readily transform into muscle or bone or cartilage.

This new method for making human muscle will be critical for the lab’s goal to develop therapies for Duchenne muscular dystrophy, an incurable muscle wasting disease that strikes young boys and is usually fatal by their 20’s.

The new protocol turned 90 percent of human pluripotent stem cells into somite cells in just four days; those somite cells then generated (left to right) cartilage, bone and muscle cells. Image: April Pyle Lab/UCLA

The new protocol turned 90 percent of human pluripotent stem cells into somite cells in just four days; those somite cells then generated (left to right) cartilage, bone and muscle cells. Image: April Pyle Lab/UCLA

Advancing Stem Cell Research at the CIRM Bridges Conference

/ Karen Ring / Leave a comment

Where will stem cell research be in 10 years?

What would you say to patients who wanted stem cell therapies now?

What are the most promising applications for stem cell research?

Why is it important for the government to fund regenerative medicine?

These challenging and thought-provoking questions were posed to a vibrant group of undergraduate and masters-level students at this year’s CIRM Bridges to Stem Cell Research and Therapy conference.

Educating the next generation of stem cell scientists

The Bridges program is one of CIRM’s educational programs that offers students the opportunity to take coursework at California state schools and community colleges and conduct stem cell research at top universities and industry labs. Its goal is to train the next generation of stem cell scientists by giving them access to the training and skills necessary to succeed in this career path.

The Bridges conference is the highlight of the program and the culmination of the students’ achievements. It’s a chance for students to showcase the research projects they’ve been working on for the past year, and also for them to network with other students and scientists.

Bridges students participated in a networking pitch event about stem cell research.

Bridges students participated in a networking pitch event about stem cell research.

CIRM kicked off the conference with a quick and dirty “Stem Cell Pitch” networking event. Students were divided into groups, given one of the four questions above and tasked with developing a thirty second pitch that answered their question. They were only given ten minutes to introduce themselves, discuss the question, and pick a spokesperson, yet when each team’s speaker took the stage, it seemed like they were practiced veterans. Every team had a unique, thoughtful answer that was inspiring to both the students and to the other scientists in the crowd.

Getting to the clinic and into patients

The bulk of the Bridges conference featured student poster presentations and scientific talks by leading academic and industry scientists. The theme of the talks was getting stem cell research into the clinic and into patients with unmet medical needs.

Here are a few highlights and photos from the talks:

On the clinical track for Huntington’s disease

Leslie Thompson, Professor at UC Irvine, spoke about her latest research in Huntington’s disease (HD). She described her work as a “race against time.” HD is a progressive neurodegenerative disorder that’s associated with multiple social and physical problems and currently has no cure. Leslie described how her lab is heading towards the clinic with human embryonic stem cell-derived neural (brain) stem cells that they are transplanting into mouse models of HD. So far, they’ve observed positive effects in HD mice that received human neural stem cell transplants including an improvement in the behavioral and motor defects and a reduction in the accumulation of toxic mutant Huntington protein in their nerve cells.

Leslie Thompson

Leslie Thompson

Leslie noted that because the transplanted stem cells are GMP-grade (meaning their quality is suitable for use in humans), they have a clear path forward to testing their potential disease modifying activity in human clinical trials. But before her team gets to humans, they must take the proper regulatory steps with the US Food and Drug Administration and conduct further experiments to test the safety and proper dosage of their stem cells in other mouse models as well as test other potential GMP-grade stem cell lines.

Gene therapy for SCID babies

Morton Cowan, a pediatric immunologist from UC San Francisco, followed Leslie with a talk about his efforts to get gene therapy for SCID (severe combined immunodeficiency disease) off the bench into the clinic. SCID is also known as bubble-baby disease and put simply, is caused by a lack of a functioning immune system. SCID babies don’t have normal T and B immune cell function and as a result, they generally die of infection or other conditions within their first year of life.

Morton Cowan

Morton Cowan, UCSF

Morton described how the gold standard treatment for SCID, which is hematopoietic or blood stem cell transplantation, is only safe and effective when the patient has an HLA matched sibling donor. Unfortunately, many patients don’t have this option and face life-threatening challenges of transplant rejection (graft-versus host disease). To combat this issue, Morton and his team are using gene therapy to genetically correct the blood stem cells of SCID patients and transplant those cells back into these patients so that they can generate healthy immune cells.

They are currently developing a gene therapy for a particularly hard-to-treat form of SCID that involves deficiency in a protein called Artemis, which is essential for the development of the immune system and for repairing DNA damage in cells. Currently his group is conducting the necessary preclinical work to start a gene therapy clinical trial for children with Artemis-SCID.

Treating spinal cord injury in the clinic

Casey Case, Asterias Biotherapeutics

Casey Case, Asterias Biotherapeutics

Casey Case, Senior VP of Research and Nonclinical Development at Asterias Biotherapeutics, gave an update on the CIRM-funded clinical trial for cervical (neck) spinal cord injury (SCI). They are currently testing the safety of transplanting different doses of their oligodendrocyte progenitor cells (AST-OPC1) in a group of SCI patients. The endpoint for this trial is an improvement in movement greater than two motor levels, which would offer a significant improvement in a patient’s ability to do some things on their own and reduce the cost of their healthcare. You can read more about these results and the ongoing study in our recent blogs (here, here).

Opinion: Scientists should be patient advocates

David Higgins gave the most moving speech of the day. He is a Parkinson’s patient and the Patient Advocate on the CIRM board and he spoke about what patient advocates are and how to become one. David explained how, these days, drug development and patient advocacy is more patient oriented and patients are involved at the center of every decision whether it be questions related to how a drug is developed, what side effects should be tolerated, or what risks are worth taking. He also encouraged the Bridges students to become patient advocates and understand what their needs are by asking them.

David Higgins, Parkinson's advocate and CIRM Board member

David Higgins

“As a scientist or clinician, you need to be an ambassador. You have a job of translating science, which is a foreign language to most people, and you can all effectively communicate to a lay audience without being condescending. It’s important to understand what patients’ needs are, and you’ll only know that if you ask them. Patients have amazing insights into what needs to be done to develop new treatments.”

Bridging the gap between research and patients

The Bridges conference is still ongoing with more poster presentations, a career panel, and scientific talks on discovery and translational stem cell research and commercializing stem cell therapies to all patients in need. It truly is a once in a lifetime opportunity for the Bridges students, many of whom are considering careers in science and regenerative medicine and are taking advantage of the opportunity to talk and network with prominent scientists.

If you’re interested in hearing more about the Bridges conference, follow us on twitter (@CIRMnews, @DrKarenRing, #CIRMBridges2016) and on Instagram (@CIRM_Stemcells).

Training the Next Generation of Stem Cell Scientists

/ Karen Ring / 2 Comments

Nobel prize winners don’t come out of thin air, they were all young, impressionable kids at one point in time.  If you ask any award-winning scientists how they got into science research, many of them would likely tell you about an inspiring teacher, an encouraging parent, or a hands-on research opportunity that inspired or helped them to pursue a scientific career.

Not every student is lucky enough to have one of these experiences, and many students, especially those from low income families, might never be exposed to good science or have the opportunity to pursue a career as a scientist.

CIRM is changing this for students in California by committing a significant portion of its funds to educating and training future stem cells scientists.

Yesterday, the Board approved over $42 million to fund two of CIRM’s educational programs, the Bridges to Stem Cell Research and Therapy Awards (Bridges) and the Summer Program to Accelerate Regenerative Medicine Knowledge (SPARK).

Bridging the Stem Cell Gap

The Bridges program supports undergraduate and master’s level students by providing paid research internships at California universities or colleges that don’t have a major stem cell research program. This program has evolved over the past seven years since it began, and now includes training and education courses in stem cell research, and direct patient engagement and outreach activities within California’s diverse communities.

CIRM’s president, Randy Mills explained in a press release:

Randy Mills, Stem Cell Agency President & CEO

Randy Mills, CIRM President & CEO

“The goal of the Bridges program is to prepare undergraduate and Master’s level students in California for a successful career in stem cell research. That’s not just a matter of giving them money, but also of giving them good mentors who can help train and guide them, of giving them meaningful engagement with patients and patient advocates, so they have a clear vision of the impact the work they are doing can have on people’s lives.”

Chairman of the CIRM Board, Jonathan Thomas, added:

Jonathan Thomas

Jonathan Thomas, Chairman of the CIRM Board

“The Bridges program has been incredibly effective in giving young people, often from disadvantaged backgrounds, a shot at a career in science. Of the 700 students who have completed the program, 95 percent are either working in a lab, enrolled in school or applying to graduate school. Without the Bridges program this kind of career might have been out of reach for many of these students.”

The CIRM Board voted to approve $40.13 million for the Bridges program, which will fund 14 programs at California state universities and city colleges. Each program will be able to support ten students for five years.

SPARKing Interest in Stem Cells

The SPARK program supports summer research internships for high school students that represent the diversity of the state’s population. It evolved from an earlier educational program called Creativity, and now emphasizes community outreach, direct patient engagement activities, and social media training along with training in stem cell research techniques.

“SPARK is all about helping cultivate high school students who are interested in science, and showing them it’s possible to have a career doing something they love,” said Randy Mills.

The Board approved $2.31 million for the SPARK program, which will provide California institutions funding support for five to ten students each year. Seven programs received funding including the Children’s Hospital Oakland Research Institute, UC San Francisco, UC Davis, Cedars-Sinai, City of Hope, USC and Stanford.

2015 Creativity Program students (now called SPARK).

2015 Creativity Program students (now called SPARK).

Training the Next Generation

For years, national leaders, including President Obama, have warned that without skilled, experienced researchers, the U.S. is in danger of losing its global competitiveness in science. But cuts in federal funding for research mean this is a particularly challenging time to begin a scientific career.

Our goal with the Bridges and SPARK programs is to address both these issues and support young scientists as they get the experience they need to launch their careers.

Related Links:

Bridging the gap: training scientists to speak everyday English

/ Kevin McCormack / 1 Comment

Getting a start in your chosen career is never easy. Without experience it’s hard to get a job. And without a job you can’t get experience. That’s why the CIRM Bridges program was created, to help give undergraduate and Master’s level students a chance to get the experience they need to start a career in stem cell research.

Last week our governing Board approved a new round of funding for this program, ensuring it will continue for another 5 years.

But we are not looking to train just any student; we are looking to recruit and retain students who reflect the diversity of California, students who might not otherwise have a chance to work in a world-class stem cell research facility.

Want to know what that kind of student looks like? What kind of work they do? Well, the Bridges program at City College of San Francisco recently got its latest group of Bridges students to record an “elevator pitch”; that’s a short video where they explain what they do and why it’s important, in language anyone can understand.

They do a great job of talking about their research in a way that’s engaging and informative; no easy matter when you are discussing things as complex as using stem cells to test whether everyday chemicals can have a toxic impact on the developing brain, or finding ways to turn off the chromosome that causes Down’s syndrome.

Regular readers of the CIRM blog know we are huge supporters of anything that encourages scientists to be better communicators. We feel that anyone who gets public funding for their work has an obligation to be able to explain that work in words the public can understand. This is not just about being responsive, there’s also a certain amount of self-interest here. The better the public understands the work that scientists do, and how that might impact their health, the more they’ll support that work.

That’s why one of the new elements we have added to the Bridges program is a requirement for the students to engage in community outreach and education. We want them to be actively involved in educating diverse communities around California about the importance of stem cell research and the potential benefits for everyone.

We have also added a requirement for the students to be directly engaged with patients. Too often in the past students studied solely in the lab, learning the skills they’ll need for a career in science. But we want them to also understand whom these skills will ultimately benefit; people battling deadly diseases and disorders. The best way to do that is for the students to meet these people face-to-face, at a bone marrow drive or at a health fair for example.

When you have seen the face of someone in need, when you know their story, you are more motivated to find a way to help them. The research, even if it is at a basic level, is no longer about an abstract idea, it’s about someone you know, someone you have met.