'Scrawny' Gene Keeps Stem Cells HealthyThu, 08 Jan 2009 11:00:00 ESTStem cells are the body's primal cells, retaining the youthful ability to develop into more specialized types of cells over many cycles of cell division. How do they do it? Scientists have identified a gene, scrawny, that appears to be a key factor in keeping a variety of stem cells in their undifferentiated state. Understanding how stem cells maintain their potency has implications for basic biology and also for medical applications.
Testes Stem Cells Can Change Into Other Body TissuesThu, 08 Jan 2009 02:00:00 ESTScientists have succeeded in isolating stem cells from human testes. The cells bear a striking resemblance to embryonic stem cells -- they can differentiate into each of the three main types of tissues of the body -- but the researchers caution against viewing them as one and the same.
Stem Cell Troops Called To Repair The Body Using New Drug CombinationsThu, 08 Jan 2009 00:00:00 ESTScientists have tricked bone marrow into releasing extra adult stem cells into the bloodstream, a technique that they hope could one day be used to repair heart damage or mend a broken bone, in a new study published in the journal Cell Stem Cell.
Stem Cells And Leukemia Battle For Marrow MicroenvironmentWed, 07 Jan 2009 02:00:00 ESTLearning how leukemia takes over privileged 'niches' within the bone marrow is helping researchers develop treatment strategies that could protect healthy blood-forming stem cells and improve the outcomes of bone marrow transplantation for leukemia and other types of cancer.
Converting Adult Somatic Cells To Pluripotent Stem Cells Using A Single VirusWed, 07 Jan 2009 00:00:00 ESTScientists have found a more efficient way to create induced pluripotent stem cells using a single virus vector instead of multiple viruses in the reprogramming process. The ability to combine four vectors into single "stem cell cassette" containing all four genes using a combination of 2A peptides and IRES dramatically improves iPS cell production efficiency -- 10 times higher than previously reported studies.
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