April 26, 2017 A mouse tibia that has been rendered transparent with Bone CLARITY. Stem cells appear distributed throughout the bone in red. The ability to see bone stem cell behavior is crucial for testing new osteoporosis treatments. Credit: Science Translational Medicine, Greenbaum, Chan, et al; Gradinaru laboratory/Caltech

Ten years ago, the bones currently in your body did not actually exist. Like skin, bone is constantly renewing itself, shedding old tissue and growing it anew from stem cells in the bone marrow. Now, a new technique developed at Caltech can render intact bones transparent, allowing researchers to observe these stem cells within their environment. The method is a breakthrough for testing new drugs to combat diseases like osteoporosis.

The research was done in the laboratory of Viviana Gradinaru (BS '05), assistant professor of biology and biological engineering and a Heritage Medical Research Institute Investigator. It appears in a paper in the April 26 issue of Science Translational Medicine.

In healthy bone, a delicate balance exists between the cells that build bone mass and the cells that break down old bone in a continual remodeling cycle. This process is partially controlled by stem cells in bone marrow, called osteoprogenitors, that develop into osteoblasts or osteocytes, which regulate and maintain the skeleton. To better understand diseases like osteoporosis, which occurs when loss of bone mass leads to a high risk of fractures, it is crucial to study the behavior of stem cells in bone marrow. However, this population is rare and not distributed uniformly throughout the bone.

"Because of the sparsity of the stem cell population in the bone, it is challenging to extrapolate their numbers and positions from just a few slices of bone," says Alon Greenbaum, postdoctoral scholar in biology and biological engineering and co-first author on the paper. "Additionally, slicing into bone causes deterioration and loses the complex and three-dimensional environment of the stem cell inside the bone. So there is a need to see inside intact tissue."

To do this, the team built upon a technique called CLARITY, originally developed for clearing brain tissue during Gradinaru's postgraduate work at Stanford University. CLARITY renders soft tissues, such as brain, transparent by removing opaque molecules called lipids from cells while also providing structural support by an infusion of a clear hydrogel mesh. Gradinaru's group at Caltech later expanded the method to make all of the soft tissue in a mouse's body transparent. The team next set out to develop a way to clear hard tissues, like the bone that makes up our skeleton.

In the work described in the new paper, the team began with bones taken from postmortem transgenic mice. These mice were genetically engineered to have their stem cells fluoresce red so that they could be easily imaged. The team examined the femur and tibia, as well as the bones of the vertebral column; each of the samples was about a few centimeters long. First, the researchers removed calcium from the bones: calcium contributes to opacity, and bone tissue has a much higher amount of calcium than soft tissues. Next, because lipids also provide tissues with structure, the team infused the bone with a hydrogel that locked cellular components like proteins and nucleic acids into place and preserved the architecture of the samples. Finally, a gentle detergent was flowed throughout the bone to wash away the lipids, leaving the bone transparent to the eye. For imaging the cleared bones, the team built a custom light- sheet microscope for fast and high-resolution visualization that would not damage the fluorescent signal. The cleared bones revealed a constellation of red fluorescing stem cells inside.

The group collaborated with researchers at the biotechnology company Amgen to use the method, named Bone CLARITY, to test a new drug developed for treating osteoporosis, which affects millions of Americans per year.

"Our collaborators at Amgen sent us a new therapeutic that increases bone mass," says Ken Chan, graduate student and co-first author of the paper. "However, the effect of these therapeutics on the stem cell population was unclear. We reasoned that they might be increasing the proliferation of stem cells." To test this, the researchers gave one group of mice the treatment and, using Bone CLARITY, compared their vertebral columns with bones from a control group of animals that did not get the drug. "We saw that indeed there was an increase in stem cells with this drug," he says. "Monitoring stem cell responses to these kinds of drugs is crucial because early increases in proliferation are expected while new bone is being built, but long-term proliferation can lead to cancer."

The technique has promising applications for understanding how bones interact with the rest of the body.

"Biologists are beginning to discover that bones are not just structural supports," says Gradinaru, who also serves as the director of the Center for Molecular and Cellular Neuroscience at the Tianqiao and Chrissy Chen Institute for Neuroscience at Caltech. "For example, hormones from bone send the brain signals to regulate appetite, and studying the interface between the skull and the brain is a vital part of neuroscience. It is our hope that Bone CLARITY will help break new ground in understanding the inner workings of these important organs."

The paper is titled "Bone CLARITY: Clearing, imaging, and computational analysis of osteoprogenitors within intact bone marrow."

Explore further: Growing new bone for more effective injury repair

More information: Alon Greenbaum et al, Bone CLARITY: Clearing, imaging, and computational analysis of osteoprogenitors within intact bone marrow, Science Translational Medicine (2017). DOI: 10.1126/scitranslmed.aah6518

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Transparent bones enable researchers to observe the stem cells inside - Medical Xpress

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A local stem cell study is changing the future of orthopedics.

A new study taking place at the Andrews Institute in Northwest Florida could shape the future of orthopedic surgery.

The goal of the study, spearheaded by Dr. Adam Anz and already eight years in the making, is to use stem cells to regrow cartilage.

If approved, it will be the first orthopedics study of its kind done in the United States and only the second in the entire world.

Stem cells are currently utilized most in cancer research and treatments, but Dr. Anz of the Andrews Institute wants to change that by putting regenerative medicine to the test, using stem cells to regrow knee cartilage.

The Andrews Institute already uses stem cells in certain therapies, but this new method could be a game changer.

"The bone marrow aspirate, which we're studying for knee arthritis and we can offer to patients, is the 1990's technology of stem cells," Dr. Anz said. "What we're studying is the modern way to harvest many more stem cells. That's the reason the FDA has said you need to bring this through our process before you just offer it to people."

Through a process called apheresis, stem cells are harvested from the patient with help from a synthetic hormone that promotes the body to generate more stem cells.

"Through this process we can collect millions of cells," Dr. Anz said. "Just 140 milliliters -- about a half of a coke can -- will have 140 million stem cells."

The stem cells will then be sorted, divided and injected into the patient's knee. Excess cells are stored in a nitrogen freezer at negative 181 degrees Celsius until the next round of injections, a process to be repeated over the next two years.

"If this study is successful, this will be the first approved in orthopedics in the United States," said Dr. Anz.

The study begins in May. Dr. Anz believes it will take about another five to seven years before the FDA can approve it for use in patients.

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Using video microscopy in the living mouse lung, UC San Francisco scientists have revealed that the lungs play a previously unrecognized role in blood production. As reported online March 22, 2017, inNature, the researchers found that the lungs produced more than half of the platelets blood components required for the clotting that stanches bleeding in the mouse circulation.

In another surprise finding, the scientists also identified a previously unknown pool of blood stem cells capable of restoring blood production when the stem cells of the bone marrow, previously thought to be the principal site of blood production, are depleted.

This finding definitely suggests a more sophisticated view of the lungs that theyre not just for respiration but also a key partner in formation of crucial aspects of the blood, said pulmonologistMark R. Looney, a professor of medicine and of laboratory medicine at UCSF and the new papers senior author. What weve observed here in mice strongly suggests the lung may play a key role in blood formation in humans as well.

The findings could have majorimplications for understanding human diseases in which patients suffer from low platelet counts, or thrombocytopenia, which afflicts millions of people and increases the risk of dangerous uncontrolled bleeding. The findings also raise questions about how blood stem cells residing in the lungs may affect the recipients of lung transplants.

The new study was made possible by a refinement of a technique known as two-photon intravital imaging recently developed by Looney and co-authorMatthew F. Krummel, a UCSF professor of pathology. This imaging approach allowed the researchers to perform the extremely delicate task of visualizing the behavior of individual cells within the tiny blood vessels of a living mouse lung.

Looney and his team were using this technique to examine interactions between the immune system and circulating platelets in the lungs, using a mouse strain engineered so that platelets emit bright green fluorescence, when they noticed a surprisingly large population of platelet-producing cells called megakaryocytes in the lung vasculature. Though megakaryocytes had been observed in the lung before, they were generally thought to live and produce platelets primarily in the bone marrow.

When we discovered this massive population of megakaryocytes that appeared to be living in the lung, we realized we had to follow this up, saidEmma Lefranais, a postdoctoral researcher in Looneys lab and co-first author on the new paper.

More detailed imaging sessions soon revealed megakaryocytes in the act of producing more than 10 million platelets per hour within the lung vasculature, suggesting that more than half of a mouses total platelet production occurs in the lung, not the bone marrow, as researchers had long presumed. Video microscopy experiments also revealed a wide variety of previously overlooked megakaryocyte progenitor cells and blood stem cells sitting quietly outside the lung vasculature estimated at 1 million per mouse lung.

The discovery of megakaryocytes and blood stem cells in the lung raised questions about how these cells move back and forth between the lung and bone marrow. To address these questions, the researchers conducted a clever set of lung transplant studies:

First, the team transplanted lungs from normal donor mice into recipient mice with fluorescent megakaryocytes, and found that fluorescent megakaryocytes from the recipient mice soon began turning up in the lung vasculature. This suggested that the platelet-producing megakaryocytes in the lung originate in the bone marrow.

Its fascinating that megakaryocytes travel all the way from the bone marrow to the lungs to produce platelets, said Guadalupe Ortiz-Muoz, a postdoctoral researcher in the Looney lab and the papers other co-first author. Its possible that the lung is an ideal bioreactor for platelet production because of the mechanical force of the blood, or perhaps because of some molecular signaling we dont yet know about.

"Its possible that the lung is an ideal bioreactor for platelet production because of the mechanical force of the blood, or perhaps because of some molecular signaling we dont yet know about."

Guadalupe Ortiz-Muoz, postdoctoral researcher in the Mark Looney Lab

In another experiment, the researchers transplanted lungs with fluorescent megakaryocyte progenitor cells into mutant mice with low platelet counts. The transplants produced a large burst of fluorescent platelets that quickly restored normal levels, an effect that persisted over several months of observation much longer than the lifespan of individual megakaryocytes or platelets. To the researchers, this indicated that resident megakaryocyte progenitor cells in the transplanted lungs had become activated by the recipient mouses low platelet counts and had produced healthy new megakaryocyte cells to restore proper platelet production.

Finally, the researchers transplanted healthy lungs in which all cells were fluorescently tagged into mutant mice whose bone marrow lacked normal blood stem cells. Analysis of the bone marrow of recipient mice showed that fluorescent cells originating from the transplanted lungs soon traveled to the damaged bone marrow and contributed to the production not just of platelets, but of a wide variety of blood cells, including immune cells such as neutrophils, B cells and T cells. These experiments suggest that the lungs play host to a wide variety of blood progenitor cells and stem cells capable of restocking damaged bone marrow and restoring production of many components of the blood.

To our knowledge this is the first description of blood progenitors resident in the lung, and it raises a lot of questions with clinical relevance for the millions of people who suffer from thrombocytopenia, said Looney, who is also an attending physician on UCSFs pulmonary consult service and intensive care units.

In particular, the study suggests that researchers who have proposed treating platelet diseases with platelets produced from engineered megakaryocytes should look to the lungs as a resource for platelet production, Looney said. The study also presents new avenues of research for stem cell biologists to explore how the bone marrow and lung collaborate to produce a healthy blood system through the mutual exchange of stem cells.

These observations alter existing paradigms regarding blood cell formation, lung biology and disease, and transplantation, said pulmonologist Guy A. Zimmerman, who is associate chair of the Department of Internal Medicine at the University of Utah School of Medicine and was an independent reviewer of the new study forNature. The findings have direct clinical relevance and provide a rich group of questions for future studies of platelet genesis and megakaryocyte function in lung inflammation and other inflammatory conditions, bleeding and thrombotic disorders, and transplantation.

The observation that blood stem cells and progenitors seem to travel back and forth freely between the lung and bone marrow lends support to a growing sense among researchers that stem cells may be much more active than previously appreciated, Looney said. Were seeing more and more that the stem cells that produce the blood dont just live in one place but travel around through the blood stream. Perhaps studying abroad in different organs is a normal part of stem cell education.

The study was supported the UCSF Nina Ireland Program in Lung Health, the UCSF Program for Breakthrough Biomedical Research, and the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI), a division of the National Institutes of Health (HL092471, HL107386 and HL130324).

It has been known for decades that the lung can be a site of platelet production, but this study amplifies this idea by demonstrating that the murine lung is a major participant in the process, said Traci Mondoro,project officer at the Translational Blood Science and Resources Branch of the NHLBI. Dr. Looney and his team have disrupted some traditional ideas about the pulmonary role in platelet-related hematopoiesis, paving the way for further scientific exploration of this integrated biology.

Additional authors included Axelle Caudrillier,Beat Mallavia,Fengchun Liu, Emily E. Thornton,Mark B. Headley,Tovo David, Shaun R. Coughlin, Andrew D. Leavitt, David M. Sayah, of UCLA; and Emmanuelle Passegu,a former UCSF faculty member who is now director of the Columbia Stem Cell Initiative at Columbia University Medical Center.

Cover photo:iStock/choja

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Surprising new role for lungs: Making blood - University of California

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Ottawa Citizen

Two weeks after his transplant, Jonathan Pitre battles kidney complications Ottawa Citizen Pitre, 16, was infused two weeks ago with stem-cell rich blood and bone marrow drawn from his mother's hip. The procedure, conducted as part of an ongoing clinical trial at the University of Minnesota Masonic Children's Hospital, is the only treatment ... and more »

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Two weeks after his transplant, Jonathan Pitre battles kidney complications - Ottawa Citizen

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Science Daily

Bare bones: Making bones transparent Science Daily Ten years ago, the bones currently in your body did not actually exist. Like skin, bone is constantly renewing itself, shedding old tissue and growing it anew from stem cells in the bone marrow. Now, a new technique developed at Caltech can render ... Scientists turn bones transparent to let them see into marrowSTAT Tissue-Clearing Technique Works on BoneThe Scientist all 4 news articles »

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Bare bones: Making bones transparent - Science Daily

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It's based on experimental research that suggests stem cells extracted from the pulp of these teeth might someday regrow a lost adult tooth or offer other regenerative medicine benefits -- some potentially life-saving.

"So I'll try not to get emotional here, but my husband was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia in 2011," said Bassetto, of Naperville, Illinois, head of a sales team at a software company.

In 2012, her husband, James, had a stem cell transplant to restore his bone marrow and renew his blood.

"He was very fortunate. He was one of six kids, and his brother was a perfect match," she said. She noted that her two children, Madeline, 23, and Alex, 19, may not be so lucky if they develop health problems, since they have only each other; the chance of two siblings being a perfect stem cell match is only 25%.

Unfortunately, her husband's stem cell transplant was not successful. He developed graft-versus-host disease, where his brother's donated stem cells attacked his own cells, and he died shortly afterward.

However, she says, the transplant had given him a chance at a longer life.

Last year, when her son saw a dentist for wisdom tooth pain, a brochure for dental stem cell storage caught Bassetto's eye and struck a chord.

"I know stem cells have tremendous health benefits in fighting disease, and there's a lot ways they're used today," she said. "Had my husband had his own cells, potentially, his treatment could have been more successful."

Medical breakthroughs happen all the time, said Bassetto. "Who knows what potential there is 20 years, 40 years down the road, when my son is an adult or an aging adult?

"Almost like a life insurance policy, is how I viewed it," she said.

Some scientists see storing teeth as a worthwhile investment, but others say it's a dead end.

"Research is still mostly in the experimental (preclinical) phase," said Ben Scheven, senior lecturer in oral cell biology in the school of dentistry at the University of Birmingham. Still, he said, "dental stem cells may provide an advantageous cell therapy for repair and regeneration of tissues," someday becoming the basis for reconstructing bone tissue, retinas and even optic neurons.

Dr. Pamela Robey, chief of the craniofacial and skeletal diseases branch of the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research, acknowledges the "promising" studies, but she has a different take on the importance of the cells.

"There are studies with dental pulp cells being used to treat neurological disorders and problems in the eye and other things," Robey said. The research is based on the idea that these cells "secrete factors that encourage local cells to begin the repair process."

"The problem is, these studies have really not been that rigorous," she said, adding that many have been done only in animals and so provide "slim" evidence of benefits. "The science needs a lot more work."

Robey would know. Her laboratory discovered dental stem cells in 2003.

"My fellows, Songtao Shi and Stan Gronthos, did the work in my lab," Robey said. "Songtao Shi is a dentist, and basically he observed that, when you get a cavity, you get what's called 'reparative dentin.' In other words, the tooth is trying to protect itself from that cavity, so it makes a little bit of dentin to kind of plug the hole, so to speak."

Dentin is the innermost hard layer of tooth that lies beneath the enamel. Underneath the dentin is a soft tissue known as pulp, which contains the nerve tissue and blood supply.

Observing dentin perform reparative work, Shi hypothesized that this must mean there's a stem cell within the tooth that's able to activate and make dentin. So if you wanted to grow an adult tooth instead of getting an implant, knowing how to make dentin would be the start of the process, explained Robey.

Pursuing this idea, Shi, Gronthos and the team conducted their first study with wisdom teeth. They discovered that pulp cells in these third molars did indeed make dentin, but the cells found in baby teeth, called SHED (stem cells from human exfoliated deciduous teeth), had slightly different properties.

"The SHED cells seem to make not only dentin but also something that is similar to bone," Robey said. This "dentin osteogenic material" is a little like bone and a little like dentin -- "unusual stuff," she said.

There is a meticulous process for extracting stem cells from the pulp.

"We very carefully remove any soft tissue that's adhering to the tooth. We treat it with disinfectant, because the mouth is not really that clean," Robey said, laughing.

Scientists then use a dental drill to pass the enamel and dentin -- "kind of like opening up a clam," said Robey -- to get to the pulp. "We take the pulp out, and we digest it with an enzyme to release the cells from the matrix of the pulp, and then we put the cells into culture and grow them."

According to Laning, even very small amounts of dental pulp are capable of producing many hundreds of millions of structural stem cells.

Harvesting dental stem cells is not a matter of waiting for the tooth to fall out and then quickly calling your dentist. When a baby tooth falls out, the viability of the pulp is limited if it's not preserved in the proper solution.

American Academy of Pediatric Dentistry President Dr. Jade Miller explained that "it's critical that the nerve tissue in that pulp tissue, the nerve supply and blood supply, still remain intact and alive." Typically, the best baby teeth to harvest are the upper front six or lower front six -- incisors and cuspids, he said.

For a child between 5 and 8 years of age, it's best to extract the tooth when there's about one-third of the root remaining, Miller said: "It really requires some planning, and so parents need to make this decision early on and be prepared and speak with their pediatric dentist about that."

Bassetto found the process easy. All it involved was a phone call to the company recommended by her dentist.

"They offer a service where they grow the cells and save those and also keep the pulp of the tooth without growing cells from it," she said. "I opted for both." From there, she said, the dentist shipped the extracted teeth overnight in a special package.

Bassetto said she paid less than $2,000 upfront, and now $10 a month for continued storage.

So is banking teeth something parents should be doing?

In a policy statement, the American Academy of Pediatric Dentistry "encourages dentists to follow future evidence-based literature in order to educate parents about the collection, storage, viability, and use of dental stem cells with respect to autologous regenerative therapies."

"Right now, I don't think it is a logical thing to do. That's my personal opinion," said Robey of the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research. As of today, "we don't have methods for creating a viable tooth. I think they're coming down the pike, but it's not around the corner."

Science also does not yet support using dental pulp stem cells for other purposes.

"That's not to say that in the future, somebody could come up with a method that would make them very beneficial," Robey said.

Still, she observed, if science made it possible to grow natural teeth from stem cells and you were in a car accident, for example, and lost your two front teeth, you'd probably be "very happy to give up a third molar to use the cells in the molar to create new teeth." Third molars are fairly expendable, she said.

Plus, Robey explained, it may not be necessary to bank teeth: Another type of stem cell, known as induced pluripotent stem cells, can be programmed into almost any cell type.

"It's quite a different story than banking umbilical cord blood, which we do know contains stem cells that re-create blood," Robey said.

"So cord blood banking -- and now we have a national cord blood bank as opposed to private clinics -- so there's a real rationale for banking cord blood, whereas the rationale for banking baby teeth is far less clear," Robey said.

And there's no guarantee that your long-cryopreserved teeth or cells will be viable in the future. Banking teeth requires proper care and oversight on the part of cryopreservation companies, she said. "I think that that's a big question mark. If you wanted to get your baby teeth back, how would they handle that? How would they take the tooth out of storage and isolate viable cells?"

Provia's Laning, who has "successfully thawed cells that have been frozen for more than 30 years," dismissed such ideas.

"Cryopreservation technology is not the problem here," he said. "Stem cells from bone marrow and other sources have been frozen for future clinical use in transplants for more than 50 years. Similarly, cord blood has a track record of almost 40 years." The technology for long-term cryopreservation has been refined over the years without any substantial changes, he said.

Despite issues and doubts, Miller, of the pediatric dentistry academy, said parents still need to consider banking baby teeth.

A grandparent, he is making the decision for his own family.

"It's really at its infancy, much of this research," he said. "There's a very strong chance there's going to be utilization for these stem cells, and they could be life-saving."

He believes that saving baby teeth could benefit not only his grandchildren but also their older siblings and various other family members if their health goes awry and a stem cell treatment is needed.

"The science is strong enough to show it's not science fiction," Miller said. "There's going to be a significant application, and I want to give my grandkids the opportunity to have those options."

Aside from cost, Miller said there are other considerations: "Is this company going to be around in 30, 40 years?" he asked. "That's not an easy thing to figure out."

Having taken the leap, Bassetto doesn't worry.

"In terms of viability, you know, if something were to happen with the company, you could always get what's stored and move it elsewhere, so I felt I was protected that way," she said. She feels "pretty confident" with her decision and plans to store her grandchildren's baby teeth.

Still, she concedes that her circumstances may be rare.

"Not everybody's going to be touched by some kind of disease where it just hits home," Bassetto said. "For me, that made it a no-brainer."

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A bone marrow drive for James Christopher Allums, 21, and his sister Elizabeth, 3, is Monday, May 1 at locations throughout northeast Louisiana.

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The News Star 11:33 a.m. CT April 26, 2017

University of Louisiana Monroe(Photo: Courtesy image)

A bone marrow drive for James Christopher Allums, 21, and his sister Elizabeth, 3, is Monday, May 1 at locations throughout northeast Louisiana.

University of Louisiana Monroe Medical Laboratory Science faculty and students are helping organize the drive. The drive on campus is 9 a.m.-5 p.m. in the SUB and Quad.

May 1 is National Fanconi Anemia Day. James Christopher and Elizabeth suffer from this disease, which is fatal without a bone marrow or stem cell transplant. They are the children of Chris and Ellen Allums.

Melanie Chapman, assistant professor to the School of Health Professions, said, "This is a wonderful opportunity for ULM Warhawks to fly high by working together and setting aside our busy agendas to give two great kids, and possibly others, the chance to live out their years. I am privileged to be a part of ULM and this community effort."

Bone marrow drive locations:

Times vary and new locations may be added. For information, check Facebook The Friends of James Christopher and Elizabeth Allums or visit caringbridge.org and search James Christopher Allums .

MORE NEWS;The Fabulous Equinox Orchestra takes the stage at ULM Friday

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Bone marrow drive for Allums siblings at ULM, other locations - Monroe News Star

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Ottawa Sun

Tough time: Jonathan Pitre battles kidney complications Ottawa Sun Pitre, 16, was infused two weeks ago with stem-cell rich blood and bone marrow drawn from his mother's hip. The procedure, conducted as part of an ongoing clinical trial at the University of Minnesota Masonic Children's Hospital, is the only treatment ... and more »

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Tough time: Jonathan Pitre battles kidney complications - Ottawa Sun

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This study aimed to explore the role of the transforming growth factor-/mitogen activated protein kinase (TGF-/MAPK) signaling pathway in the effects of bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (BMSCs) on urinary control and interstitial cystitis in a rat model of urinary bladder transplantation.

A urinary bladder transplantation model was established using Sprague-Dawley rats. Rats were assigned to normal (blank control), negative control (phosphate-buffered saline injection), BMSCs (BMSC injection), sp600125 (MAPK inhibitor injection), or protamine sulfate (protamine sulfate injection) groups. Immunohistochemistry, urodynamic testing, hematoxylin-eosin staining, Western blotting, enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay, and MTT assay were used to assess BMSC growth, the kinetics of bladder urinary excretion, pathological changes in bladder tissue, bladder tissue ultrastructure, the expression of TGF-/MAPK signaling pathway-related proteins, levels of inflammatory cytokines, and the effects of antiproliferative factor on cell proliferation.

Compared with normal, negative control, BMSCs, and sp600125 groups, rats in the PS group exhibited decreased discharge volume, maximal micturition volume, contraction interval, and bladder capacity but increased residual urine volume, bladder pressure, bladder peak pressure, expression of TGF-/MAPK signaling pathway-related proteins, levels of inflammatory cytokines, and growth inhibition rate. Levels of inflammatory cytokines and the growth inhibition rate were positively correlated with the expression of TGF-/MAPK signaling pathway-related proteins.

Our findings demonstrate that the TGF-/MAPK signaling pathway mediates the beneficial effects of BMSCs on urinary control and interstitial cystitis.

American journal of translational research. 2017 Mar 15*** epublish ***

Ya Xiao, Ya-Jun Song, Bo Song, Chi-Bing Huang, Qing Ling, Xiao Yu

Urological Research Institute of PLA, The First Affiliated Hospital, Third Military Medical UniversityChongqing 400037, P. R. China; Department of Urology, The Second Affiliated Hospital, The Third Military Medical UniversityChongqing 400037, P. R. China., Department of Urology, The Second Affiliated Hospital, The Third Military Medical University Chongqing 400037, P. R. China., Urological Research Institute of PLA, The First Affiliated Hospital, Third Military Medical University Chongqing 400037, P. R. China., Department of Urology, Tongji Hospital, Tongji Medical College of Huazhong University of Science & Technology Wuhan 430030, P. R. China.

PubMed http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28386345

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TGF-/MAPK signaling mediates the effects of bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells on urinary control and interstitial ... - UroToday

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This weekend the community will be given the chance to save the life of one of its youngest residents. On Friday, April 28, the AmVets Post No. 94 will host a bone marrow registration drive from 3-7 p.m.

Wade Wachter is the son of Adam and Jenni (Duvall) Wachter of Perryville and the grandson of Terri and Lori Duvall, Robyn Roy, and Rodney and Barb Wachter.

On the outside, little Wade is a normal kid though he has been battling a very rare form of bone marrow failure disorder called Schwachman Diamond Syndrome. This dysfunction of the bone marrow requires a lifesaving transplant. He currently takes medication daily and has routine biopsies to monitor for potential leukemia developments in his body.

This disease is so rare that funding is hard to find, which limits the number of possible treatments available. DKMS is the nonprofit group leading the charge to find a bone marrow match for Wachter.

Recent tests show that Wachter will need an immediate transplant for his best chance to have a normal childhood, and according to the DKMS website only 30 percent of patients find a donor inside their families. Nearly 14,000 patients require donations from matched individuals outside of their family line each year. Out of more than 800,000 donors in the U.S., and over 6 million worldwide, 6 out of 10 patients are still unable to find a compatible donor.

We thank DKMS and our community for working with us to help find Wade a bone marrow match, said Jenni Wachter, Wades mother. From the outside, Wade may look like your average 6-year-old child, when really he has been facing a life-threatening battle for years. Our hope is to grow the bone marrow registry to help increase the chances of finding Wade a match so he can move forward towards a healthy and happy life.

Potential donors include anyone who is in good general health between the ages of 18 to 55. Registration is free and only requires filling out a simple form and a quick swab of the inside of each cheek. DKMS covers the $65 registration and processing fee for each supporter, but donations will be accepted to cover costs.

There are two ways to donate once a match has been found. The first method is the Peripheral Blood Stem Cell (PBSC) donation. This is a non-surgical, outpatient procedure that collects blood stem cells via the bloodstream. It takes about 4-8 hours on 1-2 consecutive days. This method is used in 75 percent of all cases. The other donation method is by direct bone marrow procedure. It is a 1-2 hour surgical procedure, done under anesthesia, where a syringe collects marrow cells from the back of the pelvic bone. This method is only used in about 25 percent of the cases, usually when the patient is a child.

Anyone unable to attend the drive that wishes to register as a potential donor may do so online at http://www.dkms.org. The Perryville AmVets Post No. 94 is located at 1203 W. Saint Joseph Street.

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Bone marrow drive set for local youth - Perry County Republic Monitor

Bone Marrow Stem Cells Comments Off on Bone marrow drive set for local youth – Perry County Republic Monitor | April 26th, 2017

Wade Watcher

A Perryville family is organizing a bone-marrow registration drive in hopes of finding a match for their 6-year-old son, who needs a bone-marrow transplant.

Wade Watcher's mother Jenni said for the most part, he's a regular 6-year-old.

"Active and funny and adorable," she said. "He's smart and loves to draw. He likes playing basketball. He's a pretty awesome kid."

But for him to continue leading a normal childhood, Watcher likely would need a bone-marrow transplant.

"We knew that he had a rare disease when he was a baby, and so yearly we have to get a bone marrow biopsy to see if his bone marrow is failing," Watcher said. "It had been fairly normal until December. ... It showed his bone marrow was in the stages of failing and that it was kind of like a waiting game to see if he needs to be sent for a bone marrow transplant or not."

Wade, who suffers from Shwachman-Diamond syndrome, a rare congenital disorder, is stable, but his mother said they don't know for how long.

So they're organizing a registration drive for members of the community to sign up to have their cheek swabbed and see whether they may be a match. The drive will be from 3 to 7 p.m. Friday at the Amvets Post 94 in Perryville.

Watcher said she's not sure how many people are scheduled to participate, but she to register as many people ranging in age from 18 to 55 years old people as possible.

"Anybody that can would be amazing," she said. "It would provide a lot of help for our family as well as other families."

Registration involves filling a form and having a cheek swabbed for about 30 seconds. Donor recruitment coordinator Olivia Haddox said people typically shy away from such drives because they are unsure of what it may mean if they are "matched" with a person in need.

"People are surprised to find how easy it is just to register, but then the next question is always, 'What's going to happen if I get that call?'" she said. "We definitely get that a lot."

There are two ways for the donation to happen if a match is found, she said. About 80 percent of the time, donations are done via peripheral blood stem-cell donation, a four- to eight-hour session in which blood is taken from one arm and filtered through an aphoresis machine to separate the blood from the stem cells. After taking the stem cells, the blood is returned to the donor's body.

"That can kind of be compared to a lengthier platelet or plasma donation," Haddox said. "You don't actually even lose any blood that day; you just lose some stem cells, and you regenerate those in about a week, so what you give you do get back," she said.

People usually watch Netflix while donating, she said, and minor side effects more often come from the series of injections donors receive before the procedure to boost the stem cells. Those injections can cause some fatigue or other side effects.

"Nothing so severe that it might keep anyone out of work," Haddox said. "It's just kind of your body preparing for the donation."

The other, less-common method is an outpatient procedure whereby liquid marrow from the lower back pelvic area is removed.

"And you're actually put under for this procedure, so you're not awake when it happens and you don't feel anything when it happens," Haddox said. "Afterwards, what most people tell me they feel is just a tenderness and a bruising around the site where they removed the marrow. A lot of people equate this to saying, 'I felt like I fell on some ice, and I had a bruise on my hip for a few days.'"

If people can't attend the drive, swab kits can be ordered at dkms.org.

tgraef@semissourian.com

(573) 388-3627

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Perryville family organizing bone-marrow drive Friday for ailing 6-year-old boy - Southeast Missourian

Bone Marrow Stem Cells Comments Off on Perryville family organizing bone-marrow drive Friday for ailing 6-year-old boy – Southeast Missourian | April 25th, 2017

GETTY STOCK IMAGE

The way to the Red Planet and other mysterious worlds is being inspired by the villainous Khan from the blockbuster films, according to new research.

The use of stem cell technology may mean the difference between life and death on any attempt to travel beyond Earth into the wilderness of space.

So the first person to walk on Mars is likely to be selected from the growing group of people whose parents took the step to store their child's stem cells at birth.

Stem cells are 'blank' cells that can be reprogrammed to turn into any other cell in the body, enabling the replacement of damaged cells.

More and more British parents, including TV presenter Natalie Pinkham and dancer Darcey Bussell, are paying more than 2,000 to freeze samples from their babies' umbilical cords at birth.

Stem cells are also found in bone marrow and some body tissue, but the procedure to harvest them from umbilical cords is less risky.

Adventurous Mars pioneers will have to be especially prepared for the dangerous trip, which could expose them to cancer and other diseases, through carefully researched gene therapy.

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We wince at the thought of genetically engineered humans

Mark Hall

Mark Hall, spokesperson for the UK's leading stem cell storage and diagnostics company StemProtect, said: "We wince at the thought of genetically engineered humans.

"And we are not going to create a Khan from Star Trek specifically to get to another planet. Getting humans to Mars and beyond will be both expensive and dangerous.

"But the scientific by-products - such as huge leaps in stem cell medicine - will benefit humanity for centuries to come."

Genetic engineering has featured in two Star Trek movies, and a number of TV episodes.

IG

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This still image strikes an uncanny resemblance to a figure of a woman

Khan, who appeared in Space Seed and Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, was modified to make him stronger and to give him greater stamina and intellectual capacity than a regular human.

Mr Hall said: "The first human to walk on Mars may not even be born yet - but that's an advantage."

StemProtect believes advanced medical techniques will be required to cope with the rigours of interplanetary space.

While a trip to Mars may appear "just around the corner" in galactic terms, it is highly possible exposure to radiation along the way could lead to the astronauts developing leukaemia and other cancers even before they arrived.

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This means future travellers will have to be 'immunised' before they leave Earth.

Mr Hall said: "There was an article in The Times suggesting elephants would make ideal Martian travellers because they'd be largely immune to the radiation.

"But those laughing at the ridiculous sounding headline completely missed the point - the fact is scientists are already working on ways of getting humans there and back alive."

Recent research has shown radiation in deep space increase the risk of leukaemia while long term exposure to micro gravity may leave astronauts open to infection.

The three year round trip to Mars would affect humans at the stem cell level, leaving them with a drastically lowered immune system, NASA funded scientists say.

And NASA's own findings say stem cells may be crucial to the future of space travel, particularly how they respond in a low gravity environment.

One study showed stem cells flown in space and then cultured back on Earth had greater ability to self renew and generate any cell type, changing more easily into specialised heart muscle cells, for instance.

Mr Hall said an astronaut will have to be prepared for the journey "quite literally at the stem cell level."

He explained: "That means working with the best and most effective stem cells available to the patient - those harvested from the umbilical cord at birth."

GETTY STOCK IMAGE

The therapies required to 'immunise' humans to space travel are still being researched.

And with most space based science, it can only mean huge benefits to mankind back down on Earth when it comes to fighting otherwise deadly conditions and diseases.

Stem cells have the ability to treat a potentially infinite range of illnesses and diseases.

Stem cell therapy is already being used all over the world to treat some cancers and stroke victims - and there is fast progress being made in many other areas, including Parkinson's and Alzheimer's disease.

The rest is here:
SUPERHUMANS: Mars 'will be colonised by genetically engineered Star Trek-style beings' - Express.co.uk

Bone Marrow Stem Cells Comments Off on SUPERHUMANS: Mars ‘will be colonised by genetically engineered Star Trek-style beings’ – Express.co.uk | April 25th, 2017

It was Thursday afternoon, and the little girl from near Cologne, Germany, and the 40-year-old Duluth woman had known each other for less than 24 hours. But it was obvious that Edwards already had bonded with Ina and her little sister Mila.

They were together because the girls' mother had given Edwards a much greater gift: the gift of life.

"By your donation, I still get to be a mom," Edwards told Daniela Halfkann, 30. "(You're) a mom, so you completely understand how important it is to be here with your children."

Edwards, the mother of 15-year-old twin boys and the wife of Duluth Fire Chief Dennis Edwards, is alive because of the stem cell transplant she received at the Mayo Clinic on Oct. 31, 2014. As a result, she said, she is in remission from the rare and aggressive form of leukemia with which she had been diagnosed that June.

All she was told at the time of the transplant was that the donor was a woman from Germany.

Halfkann had registered as a potential stem cell or bone marrow donor at the large insurance company where she works in Cologne, she said. One day she received a call, saying her donation was needed.

After the six-hour procedure, Halfkann was told nothing more than that the recipient was a woman in the United States.

After a two-year waiting period required in Germany, the two women learned each other's identities last October and connected via Facebook.

Their meeting in Duluth was arranged by Amanda Schamper, Midwest donor recruitment coordinator for DKMS, the Germany-based organization that facilitated the donation.

Halfkann made the trip along with husband Stefan and their daughters, leaving their home at 3 a.m. on Tuesday and arriving at the Duluth International Airport at 5 p.m. on Wednesday.

Like Edwards, DKMS wants to raise awareness of the need for people to enter the registry, said Schamper, who also traveled to Duluth for the occasion.

She said 14,000 patients are in need of a peripheral blood stem cell or bone marrow donation, but fewer than half will get one because there's no match on the registry.

"We're looking for a particular protein in our DNA," she explained.

Only in 30 percent of cases are siblings a match. Edwards' brother and sister both had been screened, she said, and neither was a match for her.

Finding a match "is equated to finding your genetic twin, or winning the genetic lottery," Schamper said.

If more people were on the registry a process that only requires taking a swab from your cheek there would be more potential matches. But only 2 percent of eligible Americans are registered, Schamper said.

When the Halfkanns arrived at the gate on Wednesday, Dennis and Merissa Edwards, along with sons Caden and Jaxon, were waiting at the gate.

It was an emotional moment.

"It was hard for me," Merissa Edwards said on Friday, speaking to Daniela Halfkann. "I was crying. I was so emotional, so happy to meet you and hug you."

She wiped away a tear. "I still am."

"It was amazing," Halfkann responded. "I cried at the gate, too."

The Halfkanns, who are staying at the Edgewater, initially focused on recovery from jet lag. But Edwards is making sure they'll get a full taste of Duluth and Minnesota before beginning their return trip to Germany next Saturday. That includes visits to the Mall of America, the Great Lakes Aquarium and a trip up the North Shore.

A "thank-you party," open to the public, is planned on Sunday afternoon. Halfkann also will be recognized on Monday during the Saints Sports Awards ceremony at the College of St. Scholastica, where Edwards is an administrative assistant in the athletics department.

Recovery from the ravages of leukemia has been a long process, Edwards said, but she remains in remission. She gets a PET scan every six months to make sure that's still the case; the next one takes place next week.

Edwards shares her story, she said, not to call attention to herself but to highlight the need for people to take the simple step of registering as a potential donor.

"It's so important for us to help other people keep their families together and save a mother or father or son or daughter," she said. "The more people we can encourage to cheek-swab and get on the registry, the more lives we can help save and help families stay together."

TO LEARN MORE

For more information and to learn how to get on the bone marrow and peripheral blood stem cell registry, visit dkms.org.

IF YOU GO

The thank-you party for Daniela Halfkann will be from 2 to 5 p.m. on Sunday at The Other Place Bar and Grill, 3930 E. Calvary Road.

See the rest here:
Duluth woman meets the German donor whose stem cells saved her ... - WDAZ

Bone Marrow Stem Cells Comments Off on Duluth woman meets the German donor whose stem cells saved her … – WDAZ | April 24th, 2017

The biggest national project to treat patients with cerebral palsy (CP) through injection of stems cells from umbilical cord blood (UCB) into the brain began its trial run in March. The project is jointly undertaken by Royan Institute, Childrens Medical Center (affiliated to Tehran University of Medical Sciences), and the Iran Blood Transfusion Organization (IBTO). In the first phase, it will provide treatment to 130 children with CP between the ages 5-13. The treatment was tested in September 2016 on children with CP in some hospitals, and the results were highly satisfactory. Approximately four in every 1,000 children in Iran have CP while in the developed countries the rate is 2 to 2.5 per 1000 live births. Cerebral palsy is an umbrella term for the effects of damage to a developing brain by various causes. It is connected with a range of symptoms, including muscle weakness and movement problems. The damage to the brain usually occurs early on in its development, either in the baby during pregnancy or during the period soon after birth. Symptoms may include difficulties in walking, balance and motor control, eating, swallowing, speech or coordination of eye movements. Some people affected by CP also have some level of intellectual disability. No two people with cerebral palsy are affected in exactly the same way. The IBTO plans to expand the storage of stems cells from umbilical cord blood to 100,000 samples from the current 80,000, said Ali Akbar Pourfathollah, head of the organization, ILNA reported. Around 75,000 samples have been stored in private banks and 5,000 in public banks, but the number will surpass 100,000 soon, he added.

Valuable Source for Treatment Umbilical blood is a valuable source of hematopoietic stem cells which can be used for treatment of many malignant diseases such as leukemia. Hundreds of transplants have been performed using stem cells from such blood, which is easy and risk free. The use of stem cells reduces the risk of viral diseases transmission and incidence of Graft Versus Host Disease (GVHD). The ability to perform organ transplants is among the benefits of umbilical cord blood transfusion. Using stems cells is also one of the best ways to treat blood diseases since the method has a success rate of 70% worldwide. Storage of stem cells is a valuable investment. So far, 27 cord blood banks have been launched across the country. There are two types: public and private banks for stem cell storage. The former does not charge a fee for storage. But in the latter, the cost of collection and genetic testing is about $645 and the annual charge for storage is $33, according to ISNA. Pourfathollah said the IBTO is looking to store stem cells in medical cases when a patient needs to receive treatment from matched unrelated donors. In the past Iranian year (ended March 20), out of the 8,000 stem cell transplantations in the country, only 100 were from matched unrelated donors and the rest came from sibling (or related) donors. IBTO is also looking to set up coagulation/transfusion and HLA/immunogenetics laboratories in the country on par with international standards. The Immunogenetics and HLA Laboratory provides human leukocyte antigen (HLA) typing, HLA antibody identification and post-transplant engraftment monitoring services. These tests are required for patients undergoing evaluation for organ transplantation, recipients of bone marrow/stem cell transplants, patients requiring platelet transfusions from HLA-matched donors, and patients undergoing evaluation of particular health conditions.

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Treating Cerebral Palsy With UCB Stem Cells - Financial Tribune

Bone Marrow Stem Cells Comments Off on Treating Cerebral Palsy With UCB Stem Cells – Financial Tribune | April 24th, 2017

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A Lincoln student is set to save someone's life after finding out he was a match for someone who needed a bone marrow transplant.

John-Paul Dickie, the vice-president of academic affairs at the University of Lincoln, said he joined the register after his flatmate told him about it.

He doesn't know the identity of the person whose life he saved, but said he was delighted that he's been able to help someone who was desperate for a transplant.

He said: "My flatmate was involved with Lincoln Marrow, a student-led group trying to sign people up to the British Bone Marrow Register. He was telling me the benefits of it, including the fact it could potentially save someone's life.

READ MORE: Selfless mum marks 50th blood donation with daughter's first

"I signed up in February 2014, so it was a surprise when I heard back earlier this year that I was a potential match. I had some samples taken and eventually I had a date set for the operation in May.

"I'm looking forward to it, as it's an amazing way to help somebody.

"However I'm also a bit hesitant as it will require me to be strapped to a machine for four or five hours. My partner will be there to keep me company and I'll have books and TV to stop me from getting too bored."

When bone marrow is damaged it prevents a person from creating healthy blood cells and transplants like this help to treat the condition.

The transplant requires taking stem cells from the blood or bone marrow of one person and giving them to another.

John-Paul added: "There are two ways to take stem cells. One is taking them out of your back using a needle, which is painful but only 10 per cent of people have. Fortunately, I'm having the more common method in which blood is taken out of one arm, the stem cells are removed and then it is returned in the other arm."

READ MORE: 'Gordon was denied stem cell treatment, but I'll hold him in my heart forever'

Most people who need stem cells will be a match with a close family member. However, if this doesn't work then they will have to wait on the British Bone Marrow Registry.

"It's a great way to contribute and help save someone's life. All you have to do is give a sample of spit to get on the register, the process is so simple and easy. If you're able to do it, I would definitely encourage you to give it a try.

"The procedure is anonymous in case something goes wrong. You can find out their age and sex, but at the moment I don't know anything. After two years, you can apply to find out who they are."

Bone marrow donors need to be aged between 17 and 40 and already registered as a blood donor.

If you meet these criteria interested in signing up to the British Bone Marrow Register, visit their website for more information at: http://www.nhsbt.nhs.uk/bonemarrow/

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'It's amazing!' Student discovers he's a potential life-saving bone marrow match - Lincolnshire Echo

Bone Marrow Stem Cells Comments Off on ‘It’s amazing!’ Student discovers he’s a potential life-saving bone marrow match – Lincolnshire Echo | April 23rd, 2017

A dad who achieved fame as a bailiff on Channel 5's Can't Pay? We'll Take It Away! has been handed a 'death sentence' unless a donor can be found to rescue him from a terminal blood cancer.

Delroy Anglin, who reached unexpected stardom on the show, has been stricken by an aggressive form of leukaemia which ravages the blood and bones of its sufferers.

The dad-of-six was confined to a hospital bed while undergoing chemotheraphy.

But Delroy, 56, desperately needs a bone marrow transplant so he can beat the debilitating disease.

However, it's proven difficult to find a matching donor because of his minority background, and he has suffered for months since first hearing the news of his deadly illness.

Delroy, from Croydon, told the Croydon Advertiser : "You feel as if someone has pronounced a death sentence.

"Life changed in an instant. When they tell you, you're just hoping someone has made a mistake, but they haven't.

"At the end of the day, unless somebody says differently - I'm terminal."

His condition was first discovered after he requested a check-up because he had been catching more colds than he usually would.

A blood test revealed what was really affecting his usually robust health.

AML affects the stem cells in bone marrow, causing a huge amount of white blood cells to be produced. Less than half of patients can be cured of the rare disease, which causes a dangerous reduction in the number of red blood cells in the body.

"I think I was in denial because I felt so fine," said Delroy, who has been forced to quit his on-screen work.

"Life changed straight away, from diagnosis to entering the hospital was a matter of days.

"Your life just changes instantly. Everything is chaotic and it remains like that for while."

Delroy, now a grandfather, is continuing to battle the disease, which developed with shocking speed, alongside his family.

His children have rallied to support him, and although his 82-year-old mum worries, her home cooking gives him strength.

"You don't want to worry your mum," said Delroy, who is now being treated at the Royal Marsden in Sutton.

"She does worry. She comes from a generation where leukaemia was a death sentence.

"But you get the home cooking from her and build up your strength it's funny how it never changes.

"You don't know how your kids are going to react. Some react well, some become aware of their own mortality a bit, and hate going to hospitals.

"But my family have reacted so well, and I think that's because they've seen my reaction. They've been absolutely amazing."

"It's strange, people don't usually like bailiffs," he said.

"But I have had so much support, from everyone including complete strangers."

The #Match4Delroy appeal is to be led by blood cancer charity the African Caribbean Leukaemia Trust (ACLT) and encourages people to join the donor register.

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Bailiff dad who reached fame on Channel 5's Can't Pay? We'll Take It Away! gets 'death sentence' diagnosis - Mirror.co.uk

Bone Marrow Stem Cells Comments Off on Bailiff dad who reached fame on Channel 5’s Can’t Pay? We’ll Take It Away! gets ‘death sentence’ diagnosis – Mirror.co.uk | April 23rd, 2017

BROCKPORT When Chris Cella laced up his boxing gloves last Saturday night in preparation for his war within the squared circle, he was fighting for more than his undefeated fight record.

In front of the sellout crowd in Huntington, W.V., he made quick work of his opponent, working his body hard and knocking him out two minutes into the first round.

After his hand was raised cementing the victory the ring announcer handed Cella the microphone.

It was then that he shared his motivation for the win.

This fight tonight was for a special friend, a little girl named Shea. Shes the toughest warrior of all. This win is for you Shea, said Cella.

The week before the fight, Shea and her parents came out to Cellas gym, BC Boxing, where they wished him luck for his upcoming fight.

I first met Shea when she was five and her aunt brought her to the gym to train. When she came to wish me luck she stole my heart. Her beautiful smile and contagious laugh filled the gym with so much love. Shes been more of an inspiration to me that she will ever know. Shes a fighter and warrior in every sense of the word, and it felt great to get the win in her honor, Cella said.

Shea has been unable to make it to the gym for almost a year now.

Now 8 years old, Shea was diagnosed in August with AML leukemia, a type of cancer of the blood and bone marrow with excess immature white blood cells, weeks before she was to start second grade at DuBois Central Catholic School.

Since her diagnosis, Sheas journey toward being cancer-free hasnt been an easy one.

Shes had adverse reactions to her appendix and gallbladder from the chemotherapy treatments and both had to be removed.

She also had a stem cell transplant this January and struggled with with graft versus host disease of the stomach and skin, which occurs when donor bone marrow or stem cells attack the recipient.

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I know that seems like a lot of bad, but Shea had a positive outlook on this whole experience and is nothing but smiles, Sheas mother Misty McKinney said. We are hoping with in a month or two we can come home for good.

Shea cant wait to come home and have a huge pool party and get back to boxing.

Shea said she felt very special and happy, when Cella dedicated his fight to her. The boxing community at the gym has had the familys back since her diagnosis, even taking up collections of toys and gift cards at Christmastime in an attempt to give the girl a holiday she wouldnt forget.

Shea is one of the biggest inspirations Ive ever met, Cella said. She fights so hard every day, it makes my fight seem meaningless.

To keep up to date on Sheas journey and ways you can help, friend Pray for Shea on Facebook.

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Fight For Shea: Brockport man dedicates bout to DuBois girl with leukemia - The Courier-Express

Bone Marrow Stem Cells Comments Off on Fight For Shea: Brockport man dedicates bout to DuBois girl with leukemia – The Courier-Express | April 23rd, 2017

It was Thursday afternoon, and the little girl from near Cologne, Germany, and the 40-year-old Duluth woman had known each other for less than 24 hours. But it was obvious that Edwards already had bonded with Ina and her little sister Mila.

They were together because the girls' mother had given Edwards a much greater gift: the gift of life.

"By your donation, I still get to be a mom," Edwards told Daniela Halfkann, 30. "(You're) a mom, so you completely understand how important it is to be here with your children."

Edwards, the mother of 15-year-old twin boys and the wife of Duluth Fire Chief Dennis Edwards, is alive because of the stem cell transplant she received at the Mayo Clinic on Oct. 31, 2014. As a result, she said, she is in remission from the rare and aggressive form of leukemia with which she had been diagnosed that June.

All she was told at the time of the transplant was that the donor was a woman from Germany.

Halfkann had registered as a potential stem cell or bone marrow donor at the large insurance company where she works in Cologne, she said. One day she received a call, saying her donation was needed.

After the six-hour procedure, Halfkann was told nothing more than that the recipient was a woman in the United States.

After a two-year waiting period required in Germany, the two women learned each other's identities last October and connected via Facebook.

Their meeting in Duluth was arranged by Amanda Schamper, Midwest donor recruitment coordinator for DKMS, the Germany-based organization that facilitated the donation.

Halfkann made the trip along with husband Stefan and their daughters, leaving their home at 3 a.m. on Tuesday and arriving at the Duluth International Airport at 5 p.m. on Wednesday.

Like Edwards, DKMS wants to raise awareness of the need for people to enter the registry, said Schamper, who also traveled to Duluth for the occasion.

She said 14,000 patients are in need of a peripheral blood stem cell or bone marrow donation, but fewer than half will get one because there's no match on the registry.

"We're looking for a particular protein in our DNA," she explained.

Only in 30 percent of cases are siblings a match. Edwards' brother and sister both had been screened, she said, and neither was a match for her.

Finding a match "is equated to finding your genetic twin, or winning the genetic lottery," Schamper said.

If more people were on the registry a process that only requires taking a swab from your cheek there would be more potential matches. But only 2 percent of eligible Americans are registered, Schamper said.

When the Halfkanns arrived at the gate on Wednesday, Dennis and Merissa Edwards, along with sons Caden and Jaxon, were waiting at the gate.

It was an emotional moment.

"It was hard for me," Merissa Edwards said on Friday, speaking to Daniela Halfkann. "I was crying. I was so emotional, so happy to meet you and hug you."

She wiped away a tear. "I still am."

"It was amazing," Halfkann responded. "I cried at the gate, too."

The Halfkanns, who are staying at the Edgewater, initially focused on recovery from jet lag. But Edwards is making sure they'll get a full taste of Duluth and Minnesota before beginning their return trip to Germany next Saturday. That includes visits to the Mall of America, the Great Lakes Aquarium and a trip up the North Shore.

A "thank-you party," open to the public, is planned on Sunday afternoon. Halfkann also will be recognized on Monday during the Saints Sports Awards ceremony at the College of St. Scholastica, where Edwards is an administrative assistant in the athletics department.

Recovery from the ravages of leukemia has been a long process, Edwards said, but she remains in remission. She gets a PET scan every six months to make sure that's still the case; the next one takes place next week.

Edwards shares her story, she said, not to call attention to herself but to highlight the need for people to take the simple step of registering as a potential donor.

"It's so important for us to help other people keep their families together and save a mother or father or son or daughter," she said. "The more people we can encourage to cheek-swab and get on the registry, the more lives we can help save and help families stay together."

TO LEARN MORE

For more information and to learn how to get on the bone marrow and peripheral blood stem cell registry, visit dkms.org.

IF YOU GO

The thank-you party for Daniela Halfkann will be from 2 to 5 p.m. on Sunday at The Other Place Bar and Grill, 3930 E. Calvary Road.

See more here:
Duluth woman meets the German donor whose stem cells saved her life - WDAY

Bone Marrow Stem Cells Comments Off on Duluth woman meets the German donor whose stem cells saved her life – WDAY | April 23rd, 2017

In an autologous BMT procedure, the healthy stem cells from the patient are taken out and preserved

IANS | New Delhi April 21, 2017 Last Updated at 05:00 IST

A team of doctors in New Delhi has successfully treated a 24-year-old girl suffering from Multiple Sclerosis (MS) with bone marrow transplant (BMT).

Kanika Juneja was diagnosed with MS an autoimmune disorder where the body's immune system starts attacking the protective sheet covering the nerve cells in the brain and the spinal cord.

She went through several rounds of treatments but could not be cured. Juneja got another chance at life at Fortis Healthcare where the doctors treated her with BMT.

"In an autologous BMT procedure, the healthy stem cells from the patient are taken out and preserved. Chemotherapy is then administered to reset the body's immunity and then the stem cells are injected back to rescue the person from the side effects of chemotherapy. After the surgery, the patient is kept under isolation for a few months to ensure he/she does not contract any infection," explained Dr Rahul Bhargava, Director, Clinical Hematology and Bone Marrow Transplant, Fortis Memorial Research Institute (FMRI).

Since conventional steroid injections and immune therapy are expensive and don't promise a cure, Bhargava thought of going for a BMT for Juneja.

Juneja is now actively involved in raising awareness about MS amongst the community through social media.

"I had just completed my college education when I was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. I was lucky because I got diagnosed within a week of my symptoms and could avail treatment options faster," Juneja said.

"In this case, we have proved that bone marrow transplant can be seen as a successful alternate treatment option for multiple sclerosis patients, giving them a fresh shot at life," added Dr Simmardeep Singh Gill, Zonal Director, FMRI, in a statement.

Currently, there are 2.3 million people living with multiple sclerosis worldwide.

A team of doctors in New Delhi has successfully treated a 24-year-old girl suffering from Multiple Sclerosis (MS) with bone marrow transplant (BMT).

Kanika Juneja was diagnosed with MS an autoimmune disorder where the body's immune system starts attacking the protective sheet covering the nerve cells in the brain and the spinal cord.

She went through several rounds of treatments but could not be cured. Juneja got another chance at life at Fortis Healthcare where the doctors treated her with BMT.

"In an autologous BMT procedure, the healthy stem cells from the patient are taken out and preserved. Chemotherapy is then administered to reset the body's immunity and then the stem cells are injected back to rescue the person from the side effects of chemotherapy. After the surgery, the patient is kept under isolation for a few months to ensure he/she does not contract any infection," explained Dr Rahul Bhargava, Director, Clinical Hematology and Bone Marrow Transplant, Fortis Memorial Research Institute (FMRI).

Since conventional steroid injections and immune therapy are expensive and don't promise a cure, Bhargava thought of going for a BMT for Juneja.

Juneja is now actively involved in raising awareness about MS amongst the community through social media.

"I had just completed my college education when I was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. I was lucky because I got diagnosed within a week of my symptoms and could avail treatment options faster," Juneja said.

"In this case, we have proved that bone marrow transplant can be seen as a successful alternate treatment option for multiple sclerosis patients, giving them a fresh shot at life," added Dr Simmardeep Singh Gill, Zonal Director, FMRI, in a statement.

Currently, there are 2.3 million people living with multiple sclerosis worldwide.

IANS

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In your biology class, you may have learned that lungs help us breathe while bone marrow, found in flat bones such as the hip bone, produces red and white blood cells through a process called hematopoiesis. Now, a new study conducted by University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) researchers has discovered that in addition to being a crucial part of our respiratory system, lungs also play a major role in the production and storage of blood cells.

Like many medical breakthroughs, the scientists stumbled upon this discovery by accident. The team, led by Professor Mark R. Looney, was trying to observe how platelets (cells that form clots to stop bleeding) circulating in the lungs interact with the immune system in mice. To trace the cells path, the rodents had been genetically modified so that the platelets appeared a glowing green.

To the scientists' astonishment, the lungs were filled with megakaryocytes the cells responsible for producing platelets. Though experts have always known of the existence of these cells inside the lungs, the numbers had been believed to be tiny. Emma Lefranais, who co-wrote the study, says, "When we discovered this massive population of megakaryocytes that appeared to be living in the lung, we realized we had to follow this up."

Further examination revealed that the megakaryocytes in the lungs were producing over 10 million platelets, or more than half the total platelets, produced by a mouse, every hour. The researchers also noticed the large population (1 million per mouse lung) of blood stem cells (which produce red blood cells) as well as megakaryocyte progenitor cells (which generate megakaryocyte cells) on the periphery of the lungs. Looney says, To our knowledge, this is the first description of blood progenitors resident in the lung.

To investigate the significance, the scientists conducted three studies. First, they transplanted lungs from normal mice into the genetically engineered ones to see how the blood stem cells move throughout the body. By following the fluorescent cells, they discovered that megakaryocytes originate in the bone marrow but migrate to the lungs to produce platelets.

To test the practical applications of this discovery and see if it would be useful in the treatment of disorders like lung inflammation, Looneys team injected the fluorescent megakaryocyte progenitor cells into mice with low platelet counts. To their delight, the transplanted cells got to work immediately, restoring the platelet count to normal levels within a short time. What was even more encouraging is that the effect lasted for several months.

Finally, the researchers transplanted healthy lungs in which all the cells had been fluorescently tagged into mice whose bone marrow was not producing blood cells or platelets. The researchers found that the glowing green megakaryocyte progenitor cells instantly migrated from the lungs to the bone marrow, where they helped to produce platelets and other critical blood components, like neutrophils, B cells, and T cells.

While the scientists, who published their findings in the journal Nature on March 22, 2017, still need to test if human lungs are as effective, the findings are being hailed as a major breakthrough. Traci Mondoro from the US National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, says, "Looney and his team have disrupted some traditional ideas about the pulmonary role in platelet-related hematopoiesis, paving the way for further scientific exploration of this integrated biology."

Resources: newatlas.com, UCSF.edu

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Lungs Don't Just Help Us Breathe They Produce Blood, Too - DOGOnews

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