U.S. scientists grow nerve cells from umbilical stem cells: What could be more tragic than a woman in her prime, trapped in a chronic, unpredictable and progressive disease of the central nervous system that causes her to suffer from constant pain, spasms and tremors, incontinence, constipation, memory loss, difficulty concentrating, anxiety, depression—and eventually, paralysis and blindness?
Or a young man suddenly and fully paralyzed by a spinal cord injury from a violent attack or accident?
The world’s first medication using stem cells collected from other people got the green light for commercial sales from South Korea’s drug agency on January 19. [see our post on Cartistem: Stem Cell Treatments in South Korea.]
Cartisem is used to treat degenerative arthritis and knee cartilage defects by regenerating knee cartilage using stem cells developed from umbilical cord blood taken from newborn babies, the Korea Food and Drug Administration said. It is developed by Seoul-based Medipost Co., Ltd., a biotechnology company listed in the Kosdaq.
Cheating athletes to turn themselves into Bionic men with stem cells in the future? With their potential to turn into any kind of cell in the body, stem cells hold the potential to revolutionize medicine. And now they also hold the potential to revolutionize cheating in athletic competitions.
A new technology — right at the cutting-edge of tissue re-engineering research and being explored to treat muscular dystrophy or create quicker recovery time from a torn knee ligament — could also be exploited by athletes to enhance their performance.
Scientists to create artificial testicle to treat male infertility: Here’s good news for infertile men. If two scientists from San Francisco, California are successful, in about a decade, infertile men may be able to produce their own sperm and conceive children.
The two men hope to create the world’s first artificial human testicle that can produce sperm. Now with a Small Business Innovation Research grant from the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, they have embarked on the project, which they hope to finish in five to seven years.
Don’t miss the first part of this article, Is Tamiflu Safe & Effective? Cochrane Review vs. Roche Pharma.
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