When Tyler was born, the umbilical cord was wrapped around his neck, causing a lack of oxygen to his brain that led to Tyler suffering a stroke during delivery. The stroke caused damage to the back of Tylers brain. Tyler was diagnosed with cerebral palsy and his mother, Lisa Biermann, was told to expect the worst: a child who would never walk, talk, or have any chance at a normal life. Lisa refused to give up hope. She tried everything she could to help Tyler. Tyler could not walk because his feet would not sit flat on the floor. She tried botox injections every three months, braces, casts and even ankle cord surgery. Nothing worked. Lisa said Tyler could not communicate with her at all. She never knew when he was in pain because he was unable to tell her. Tyler was considered to be blind, with a prescription that was over nine units nearsighted, and his eyes jumped around. Even with glasses, he could not focus his vision, and doctors did not believe he could see, or ever would see. Until he was 8 years old, Lisa would carry Tyler from his classes at Woodland Park Elementary. When Tyler … Continue reading →

Public release date: 1-May-2012 [ | E-mail | Share ] Contact: Charles Casey charles.casey@ucdmc.ucdavis.edu 916-734-9048 University of California - Davis Health System UC Davis Health System researchers are a step closer to launching human clinical trials involving the use of an innovative stem cell therapy to fight the virus that causes AIDS. In a paper published in the May issue of the Journal of Virology, the UC Davis HIV team demonstrated both the safety and efficacy of transplanting anti-HIV stem cells into mice that represent models of infected patients. The technique, which involves replacing the immune system with stem cells engineered with a triple combination of HIV-resistant genes, proved capable of replicating a normally functioning human immune system by protecting and expanding HIV-resistant immune cells. The cells thrived and self-renewed even when challenged with an HIV viral load. "We envision this as a potential functional cure for patients infected with HIV, giving them the ability to maintain a normal immune system through genetic resistance," said lead author Joseph Anderson, an assistant adjunct professor of internal medicine and a stem cell researcher at the UC Davis Institute for Regenerative Cures. "Ideally, it would be a one-time treatment through which stem cells … Continue reading →

South San Francisco, CA (Marketwire) - VistaGen Therapeutics, Inc. (OTCBB:VSTA) (OTCQB:VSTA), a biotechnology company applying stem cell technology for drug rescue and cell therapy, has licensed breakthrough stem cell culture technology from the McEwen Centre for Regenerative Medicine located at the University Health Network (UHN) in Toronto, Canada. VistaGen will be utilizing the licensed technology to develop hematopoietic precursor stem cells from human pluripotent stem cells, with the goal of developing drug screening and cell therapy applications for human blood system disorders. The breakthrough technology is included in a new United States patent application. Hematopoietic precursor stem cells give rise to all red and white blood cells and platelets in the body. VistaGen will use the UHN invention to improve the cell culture methods used to efficiently produce hematopoietic stem cell populations. "This technology dramatically advances our ability to produce and purify this important blood stem cell precursor for both in vitro drug screening and in vivo cell therapy applications," said H. Ralph Snodgrass, PhD, VistaGen's President and Chief Scientific Officer. "In addition to defining new cell culture methods for our use, the technology describes the surface characteristics of stem cell-derived adult hematopoietic stem cells. Most groups study embryonic blood … Continue reading →

ScienceDaily (May 2, 2012) UC Davis Health System researchers are a step closer to launching human clinical trials involving the use of an innovative stem cell therapy to fight the virus that causes AIDS. In a paper published in the May issue of the Journal of Virology, the UC Davis HIV team demonstrated both the safety and efficacy of transplanting anti-HIV stem cells into mice that represent models of infected patients. The technique, which involves replacing the immune system with stem cells engineered with a triple combination of HIV-resistant genes, proved capable of replicating a normally functioning human immune system by protecting and expanding HIV-resistant immune cells. The cells thrived and self-renewed even when challenged with an HIV viral load. "We envision this as a potential functional cure for patients infected with HIV, giving them the ability to maintain a normal immune system through genetic resistance," said lead author Joseph Anderson, an assistant adjunct professor of internal medicine and a stem cell researcher at the UC Davis Institute for Regenerative Cures. "Ideally, it would be a one-time treatment through which stem cells express HIV-resistant genes, which in turn generate an entire HIV-resistant immune system." To establish immunity in mice whose … Continue reading →

Current nanomedicine research has focused on the delivery of established and novel therapeutics. But a UNC team is taking a different approach. They developed nanoparticle carriers to successfully deliver therapeutic doses of a cancer drug that had previously failed clinical development due to pharmacologic challenges. They report their proof of principle findings in the April 30, 2012 early online edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Wortmannin is a drug that was highly promising as a cancer drug, but its successful preclinical studies did not translate into clinical efficacy because of challenges such as high toxicity, low stability and low solubility (unable to be dissolved in blood). Andrew Z. Wang, MD, study senior author, says, "Drug development is a difficult and expensive process. For a cancer drug to make it to clinical use, it not only has to be effective against cancer cells, but also needs to have low toxicity, good stability and good solubility. Many promising drugs such as wortmannin failed clinical development because they failed one or more of these requirements. Nanoparticle drug delivery is a breakthrough technology and has the ability to overcome these limitations. Our study is a proof of principle to demonstrate that … Continue reading →

Fine-tuning Nanotech to Target Cancer Programmable nanoparticles have shown promise in early cancer trials, and may finally fulfill the promise of nanomedicine. The results of the human trials are startling. Even at a lower-than-usual dose, multiple lung metastases shrank or even disappeared after one patient received only two-hour-long intravenous infusions of an experimental cancer drug. Another patient saw her cervical tumor reduce by nearly 60 percent after six months of treatment. Though the drug trialby Bind Biosciences in Cambridge, Massachusettsof an experimental nanotechnology-based technique was designed simply to show whether the technology is safe, the encouraging results revive hopes that nanomedicine could realize its elusive promise. For more than a decade, researchers have been trying to develop nanoparticles that would deliver drugs more effectively and safely. The idea is that a nanoparticle containing a drug compound could selectively target tumor cells or otherwise diseased cells, and avoid healthy ones. Antibodies or other molecules can be attached to the nanoparticle and used to precisely identify target cells. "One of the largest advantages of nanotechnology is you can engineer things in particle form so that chemotherapeutics can be targeted to tumor cells, protecting the healthy cells of the body and protecting patients … Continue reading →

A new bio-inspired approach to synthesising polymers will offer unprecedented control over the final polymer structure and yield advances in nanomedicine, researchers say. In a study published last week in the prestigious journal Nature Chemistry, researchers from the University of New South Wales in Sydney and the University of Warwick in the UK have outline a new method of polymer synthesis based on a combination of segregation and templating a pair of natural approaches that have evolved over billions of years to direct complex biological processes. Segregation improves biochemical control in organisms' cells by organising reactants into defined, well-regulated environments, while the transfer of genetic information is a primary function of templating, states the paper. "The ability to synthesise polymers with such precision and control will enable us to tailor-make polymers for specific needs, with major applications in materials chemistry, nanotechnology and nanomedicine," says co-author Associate Professor Per Zetterlund, Deputy Director of the Centre for Advanced Macromolecular Design (CAMD) in the School of Chemical Engineering at UNSW. Polymers are large molecules comprising thousands of small molecules or monomers bonded together to form a chain-like structure. Polymers can have different properties and functionality depending on their constituent parts, and a range … Continue reading →

ScienceDaily (May 2, 2012) A new biomimetic approach to synthesising polymers will offer unprecedented control over the final polymer structure and yield advances in nanomedicine, researchers say. In a University of Warwick-led study published in the journal Nature Chemistry, researchers from the UK (Prof Rachel O'Reilly, Dr Ronan McHale, and Joseph Patterson of the University of Warwick) and Australia (A/Prof Per Zetterlund of UNSW) outline a new method of polymer synthesis based on combination of segregation and templating -- a pair of natural approaches that have evolved over billions of years that direct complex biological processes. Segregation improves biochemical control in organisms' cells by organising reactants into defined, well-regulated environments, while the transfer of genetic information is a primary function of templating, the paper states. Professor Rachel O'Reilly from the Department of Chemistry at the University of Warwick said: "The ability to synthesise polymers with such precision and control will enable us to tailor make polymers for specific needs, with major applications in materials chemistry, nanotechnology and nanomedicine." Polymers are large molecules comprising thousands of small molecules -- or monomers -- bonded together to form a chain-like structure. Polymers can have different properties and functionality depending on their constituent parts, … Continue reading →

PARIS & PHILADELPHIA--(BUSINESSWIRE)-- Nanomedicine and Medical Education leaders are joining their forces in the United States to accelerate the development of NanoXray Nanobiotix, a company developing novel cancer nanotherapeutics and Thomas Jefferson University, one of Philadelphia's premier medical and health sciences universities, today announced that they have entered into a research collaboration to accelerate the development of Nanobiotix lead compound NBTXR3 in the US. Under the terms of the collaboration agreement, Nanobiotix will fund a 2-year preclinical research program, which will be directed by Bo Lu, MD, Professor in the Department of Radiation Oncology at Jefferson and Director of the departments Division of Molecular Radiation Biology. The goal of the program is to study the therapeutic efficacy of NBTXR3, the lead product of Nanobiotix NanoXray pipeline. NBTXR3, a nanoparticle consisting of hafnium oxide crystals, aims to enhance the local destruction of the tumor mass during radiotherapy. It accumulates in the cancer cells and, upon radiation, emits huge amounts of electrons leading to the formation of free radicals. These, in turn, damage the cancer cells and cause their targeted destruction. As a result, the destructive power of standard radiation therapy is locally and selectively enhanced within the tumor cells. For the … Continue reading →