UGA Chemical Testing Could Impact Agriculture, Consumers The University of Georgia's Regenerative Bioscience Center has been on the cutting edge of stem cell research over the past decade. And recently, they received a grant from the EPA to test... By: GeorgiaFarmMonitor … Continue reading →

NEW YORK U.S. and Japanese scientists who reported that they'd found a startlingly simple way to make stem cells withdrew that claim Wednesday, admitting to "extensive" errors in the research. In two papers published in January in the journal Nature, the researchers said that they'd been able to transform ordinary mouse cells into versatile stem cells by exposing them to a mildly acidic environment. Someday, scientists hope to harness stem cells to grow replacement tissue for treating a variety of diseases. While researchers have long been able to perform such transformations with a different method, the newly reported technique was far simpler, and the papers caused a sensation and some skepticism in the research community. They were also widely reported in the media, including by The Associated Press. But before long, the government-funded Riken Center for Developmental Biology in Japan accused one of its scientists, Haruko Obokata, of falsifying data in the research. Obokata, the key author of the papers, defended the results during a televised news conference in April while apologizing for using wrong and altered images in the published reports. She also said she opposed withdrawing the papers, a process called retraction, and the 30-year-old attributed her mistakes … Continue reading →

FRANCK ROBICHON/EPA/CORBIS Masatoshi Takeichi, who has led The RIKEN CDB since its founding in 2000, has received excessive criticism, some international researchers say. Researchers around the globe are voicing support for a Japanese research centre that faces dismantlement after one of its researchers was found guilty of scientific misconduct. The controversy swirls around Haruko Obokata, a biochemist at the RIKEN Center for Developmental Biology (CDB) in Kobe, who was found guilty of manipulating data in a paper, published in Nature, that claims a recipe for making embryonic-like stem cells with a technology called stimulus-triggered acquisition of pluripotency (STAP). (Natures news and comment team is editorially independent of its research editorial team.) In April, RIKEN launched an independent reform committee to advise on how the CDB can avoid such incidents in the future. In a 29-page report released on 12 June, the panel advised quickly dismantling the 14-year-old centre. A caveat included in the report that a new organization might be built in its place did not appease concerned scientists. At least 160 have written to RIKEN management in support for one of the worlds outstanding research institutes in the area of developmental and cell biology, in the words of stem-cell … Continue reading →

A new study shows that adipose-derived human stem cells, which can become vital tissues such as bone, may be highly resistant to the common chemotherapy drug methotrexate (MTX). The preliminary finding from lab testing may prove significant because MTX causes bone tissue damage in many patients. MTX is used to treat cancers including acute lymphoblastic leukemia, the most common form of childhood cancer. A major side effect of the therapy, however, is a loss of bone mineral density. Other bone building stem cells, such as bone marrow derived stem cells, have not withstood MTX doses well. "Kids undergo chemotherapy at such an important time when they should be growing, but instead they are introduced to this very harsh environment where bone cells are damaged with these drugs," said Olivia Beane, a Brown University graduate student in the Center for Biomedical Engineering and lead author of the study. "That leads to major long-term side effects including osteoporosis and bone defects. If we found a stem cell that was resistant to the chemotherapeutic agent and could promote bone growth by becoming bone itself, then maybe they wouldn't have these issues." Stem cell survivors Originally Beane was doing much more basic research. She … Continue reading →