A team of researchers led by Pierre Vanderhaeghen and Vincent Bonin (VIB-KU Leuven, Université libre de Bruxelles and NERF) showed how human nerve cells can develop at their own pace, and form highly precise connections ...
Nov 21, 2019
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Scientists at the University of Würzburg have successfully produced human tissues from stem cells. They have a complexity similar to that of normal tissue and are far superior to previous structures.
Nov 19, 2019
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Human skin completely renews itself every month thanks to the presence of stem cells in the deepest layer, which generate all the upper layers of this tissue. The deciphering of genes that regulate stemness remains an enigma ...
Oct 29, 2019
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Zebrafish—striped fish a few centimeters long—have the ability to regrow up to 20 percent of their hearts after sustaining major damage. Now, Caltech scientists have discovered that embryonic cells from the hindbrain, ...
Oct 22, 2019
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Embryonic stem cells (ESCs) can give rise to many types of tissues and organs. At the turn of the century, these cells were believed to offer hope of treatment for several health problems, but as research advanced, scientists ...
Sep 25, 2019
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The first signs of Huntington's, an inherited disease that slowly deteriorates bodies and minds, don't typically surface until middle age. But new findings suggest that something in the brain might be amiss long before symptoms ...
Sep 17, 2019
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New research from the University of Maryland and the National Institutes of Health reveals a new role for the enzyme telomerase. Telomerase's only known role in normal tissue was to protect certain cells that divide regularly, ...
Sep 02, 2019
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Public funding for fundamental research is essential for innovation and the development of new medicines. This is demonstrated by Professor Science Based Business Simcha Jong and his colleague Hsini Huang after studying U.S. ...
Jul 22, 2019
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A newly described form of stress called chromatin architectural defect, or chromatin stress, triggers in cells a response that leads to a longer life. Researchers at Baylor College of Medicine and the Houston Methodist Research ...
Jul 10, 2019
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MicroRNAs are tiny molecules of nucleic acid that control gene expression, acting like a dimmer switch to tone down gene output at key positions in the network of information that governs a cell's function. MicroRNAs are ...
Jun 27, 2019
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Embryonic stem cells (ES cells) are stem cells derived from the inner cell mass of an early stage embryo known as a blastocyst. Human embryos reach the blastocyst stage 4–5 days post fertilization, at which time they consist of 50–150 cells.
Embryonic Stem (ES) cells are pluripotent. This means they are able to differentiate into all derivatives of the three primary germ layers: ectoderm, endoderm, and mesoderm. These include each of the more than 220 cell types in the adult body. Pluripotency distinguishes ES cells from multipotent progenitor cells found in the adult; these only form a limited number of cell types. When given no stimuli for differentiation, (i.e. when grown in vitro), ES cells maintain pluripotency through multiple cell divisions. The presence of pluripotent adult stem cells remains a subject of scientific debate; however, research has demonstrated that pluripotent stem cells can be directly generated from adult fibroblast cultures.
Because of their plasticity and potentially unlimited capacity for self-renewal, ES cell therapies have been proposed for regenerative medicine and tissue replacement after injury or disease. However Diseases treated by these non-embryonic stem cells include a number of blood and immune-system related genetic diseases, cancers, and disorders; juvenile diabetes; Parkinson's; blindness and spinal cord injuries. Besides the ethical concerns of stem cell therapy (see stem cell controversy), there is a technical problem of graft-versus-host disease associated with allogeneic stem cell transplantation. However, these problems associated with histocompatibility may be solved using autologous donor adult stem cells or via therapeutic cloning.
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