Connecting You to Tomorrow's Biotechnology Innovations
Controlling Immune System Fuel Puts the Brakes on Macrophage Damage When tissue is damaged, one of the body’s first inflammatory immune-system responders are macrophages, cells which are commonly thought of as “construction workers” that clear away damaged tissue debris and initiate repair. However, prolonged inflammation promotes the progression of many diseases, including obesity. Now, a […]
A new drug discovery system allows scientists to specifically target members of an important family of enzymes, called phosphatases, which were previously considered mostly “undruggable”. Scientists from the Medical Research Council (MRC) Laboratory of Molecular Biology, in Cambridge, UK, demonstrated the capabilities of the new system by identifying a molecule that could successfully target a […]
Pluristem Therapeutics Inc., a leading developer of placenta-based cell therapy products, announced positive top-line results from its multinational Phase II clinical study of PLX-PAD cells in the treatment of Intermittent Claudication (IC). PLX-PAD treatment reduced Incidence of revascularization and improved patients’ mobility. Study results also validate the design of Pluristem’s ongoing Pivotal Phase III study […]
Researchers at UC Davis have confirmed that autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplant improves survival for people suffering from multiple myeloma, yet many potentially eligible patients never undergo the procedure. Using data from two extensive California databases, the team showed median overall survival for transplant patients was around 73 months, while controls who did not receive […]
Changes in cellular struts called microtubules (MT) can affect the stiffness of diseased human heart muscle cells, and reversing these modifications can lessen the stiffness and improve the beating strength of these cells isolated from transplant patients with heart failure, found researchers from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. This Nature […]
Self-Condensation Process for Cells Generates Vascularized Organ Tissues for Transplant Researchers tissue-engineered human pancreatic islets in a laboratory that develop a circulatory system, secrete hormones like insulin and successfully treat sudden-onset type 1 diabetes in transplanted mice. In a study published by Cell Reports, the scientists use a new bioengineering process they developed called a […]
Researchers in China have discovered that an enzyme called UGT8 drives the progression of basal-like breast cancer, an aggressive form of the disease that is largely untreatable. But the study, which will be published May 4 in the Journal of Experimental Medicine, reveals that the widely used osteoporosis drug zoledronic acid inhibits UGT8 and prevents […]
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has expanded approval for a personalized cellular therapy developed at the University of Pennsylvania’s Abramson Cancer Center, this time for the treatment of adult patients with relapsed or refractory large B-Cell lymphoma after two or more lines of systemic therapy. Today’s approval includes treatment of diffuse large B-cell […]
Columbia biomedical engineers invent innovative technique to help injured hearts regenerate, through therapeutic application of extracellular vesicles secreted by cardiomyocytes derived from human pluripotent stem cells Heart disease is a major global health problem–myocardial infarction annually affects more than one million people in the U.S. alone, and there is still no effective treatment. The adult […]
A drug given to early stage lung cancer patients before they undergo surgery showed major tumor responses in the removed tumor and an increase in anti-tumor T-cells that remained after the tumor was removed, which resulted in fewer relapse cases in the patients. The research teams at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg~Kimmel Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy, […]
Inhibition of the oncogenic kinase AKT, a key protein governing the cell cycle, was found to arrest cancer cell proliferation and triggered their programmed death by apoptosis. The study, published today in Oncogene, represents significant progress in the clinical translation of previous basic scientific discoveries. “Understanding the molecular features that govern cancer cell behavior is […]
HDAC inhibitors are effective in treating ovarian tumors with mutations in the ARID1A gene. Wistar researchers have found rationale for repurposing a class of antitumor compounds called HDAC inhibitors, already approved by the FDA for the treatment of diseases such as leukemia, as a new therapeutic option for ovarian cancer with mutations in the ARID1A […]
A study conducted at The Wistar Institute in collaboration with The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center has demonstrated the efficacy of targeting aberrantly active telomerase to treat therapy-resistant melanoma. The research was published in the journal Clinical Cancer Research. The introduction of targeted therapies and immune checkpoint blockade therapies has revolutionized the therapeutic options […]
Creating enough nanovesicles to inexpensively serve as a drug delivery system may be as simple as putting the cells through a sieve, according to an international team of researchers who used mouse autologous — their own — immune cells to create large amounts of fillable nanovesicles to deliver drugs to tumors in mice. Nanovesicles are […]
A prospective new method of treating patients with multiple sclerosis has been proposed by researchers of the Mainz University Medical Center working in cooperation with researchers of the University of Montreal. In model trials and experiments employing human endothelial cells, they discovered that the EGFL7 protein hinders the migration of immune cells into the central […]
Frontiers in Medicine has published key findings from a study of PLX-R18, a cell-based therapy using human placenta, demonstrated the cells’ efficacy in improving human hematopoietic engraftment. The article titled, “Posttransplant Intramuscular Injection of PLX-R18 Mesenchymal-Like Adherent Stromal Cells Improves Human Hematopoietic Engraftment in A Murine Transplant Model” was published in the peer-reviewed journal’s February […]
Jakub Famulski, an assistant professor of biology in the University of Kentucky College of Arts and Sciences, has received a grant for over $1.8 million from the National Institutes of Health to study the early formation of the anterior segment of the eye. The research has the potential to lead to more treatment options for patients with blinding disorders. […]
(CNET) Humans have always been obsessed with stalling death. It’s something countless characters and historical figures have sought, from Gilgamesh to Juan Ponce de Leon. The fascination has endured in the modern world too, with the US longevity sector worth an estimated $7.1 trillion. Not surprisingly, the tech industry is vying for a piece of […]
A team of researchers at the University of Georgia’s Regenerative Bioscience Center and ArunA Biomedical, a UGA startup company, have developed a new treatment for stroke that reduces brain damage and accelerates the brain’s natural healing tendencies in animal models. They published their findings in the journal Translational Stroke Research. The research team led by […]
Researchers may have found a way to reduce ongoing heart damage that occurs long after a severe heart attack by improving the longevity of stem cells injected into the heart. The new study shows that a protein infused into the bloodstream, can improve the healing properties of stem cell therapy in animal models of the […]