Stem Cell Clinic

Stem-cell research a step closer to making blood donation redundant – Cosmos

By Stell Cell Research

Illustration showing blood stem and progenitor cells emerging from hemogenic endothelial cells. The left blue cells are emerging hematapoietic stem and progenitor cells. The red cells are red blood cells.

OReilly Science Art

When human embryonic stem cells lit up the worlds headlines in 1998, it seemed the era of spare organs and tissues would soon follow.

One of the hopes was that these blank slate cells would fill the gap in the fraught supplies of blood banks by generating an endless supply of the different blood-cell types.

Almost two decades on this dream is approaching reality, as two papers in Nature suggest.

One team, led by George Daley of Boston Children's Hospital's Stem Cell Program, have trained human pluripotent stem cells (either derived from embryos or induced from skin cells) to do a fair job of replenishing a mouses blood supply.

The other team, led by Shahin Rafii of Cornell University in New York, began with endothelial cells scraped from the lining of mouse blood vessels. After training, these cells did an even better job of replenishing a mouses blood supply.

Both teams relied on genes introduced by viruses to train the cells. While the introduction of these foreign genes raises concerns as to the long-term safety of such cells, the scientists nevertheless achieved what has till now been impossible: repopulating the blood supply of a mouse.

Its great; were part of the way there, says Andrew Elefanty, who has been attempting the same feat without adding foreign genes at the Murdoch Childrens Research Institute in Melbourne.

Elefanty, like his colleagues, found the key to educating stem cells to become blood-cell precursors was to be a keen and patient student of nature.

Whether mice or humans, developing embryos proceed through a precisely choreographed set of stages, cued by specific signals, to form different tissues. In the case of blood cells, the first cue comes at a primitive stage when a tissue called the mesoderm appears. Under further cues, mesoderm cells give rise to what is known as haemogenic endothelium. After several weeks and more cues, these cells give rise to haematopoietic stem cells (HSC) that ultimately reside in the bone marrow. Just one of these cells is powerful enough to replenish the entire blood supply of a mouse.

Repeating this performance in a culture dish starting from stem cells, however, has been difficult. Over the past two decades, researchers have often gone down the wrong path producing yolk blood cells, for instance, that have little ability to regenerate a whole blood supply.

Just last year, Elefanty and colleagues were able to reproduce the first part of the program, training embryonic stem cells to go from the mesoderm stage to haemogenic endothelium using growth factors added to the medium bathing the cells. So far his group has not been able to take the cells the final step of the way.

Daleys group followed a similar formula but took the cells the final step by pushing them with seven genes introduced by viruses.

Rafiis group began with endothelial cells derived from the lining of mouse blood vessels, made them stem-cell-like by introducing four genes, and then completed their education them by growing them on a layer of cells derived from umbilical cord.

Both produced cells that, like HSC, were able to repopulate the blood supply of a mouse.

Elefanty notes the blood stem cells produced by the two groups are not perfect at matching the capabilities of what real HSC can do. Given both methods insert foreign genes, he also notes there are safety issues to deal with: These are just the first papers; there are still lots of questions to answer.

The goal, as Daley et al acknowledge, remains the derivation of bona fide transgene-free HSCs for applications in research and therapy.

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Stem-cell research a step closer to making blood donation redundant - Cosmos

Pope Francis to Huntington’s patients: You deserve respect and love – Catholic News Agency

By Stell Cell Research

Vatican City, May 18, 2017 / 08:22 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Francis on Thursday offered a message of hope and love to patients with Huntingtons disease, a rare and incurable genetic brain disorder that causes intense suffering.

According to organizers, it was the first time that a pope - or any world leader - had recognized the plight of those with the disease.

In his speech, Francis said the fears and difficulties of people affected by Huntingtons disease have been surrounded with misunderstandings and barriers (for) far too long.

In many cases the sick and their families have experienced the tragedy of shame, isolation and abandonment. Today, however, we are here because we want to say to ourselves and all the world: HIDDEN NO MORE! he said.

This isnt just a slogan, but a commitment we must foster, he continued.

The strength and conviction with which we pronounce these words derive precisely from what Jesus himself taught us, he said, noting that throughout his ministry, Jesus met many sick people; he took on their suffering; he tore down the walls of stigma and of marginalization that prevented so many of them from feeling respected and loved.

Pope Francis spoke during a conference organized at the Vatican hosting people affected by Huntingtons disease, along with their families and caretakers.

Huntingtons disease is characterized by rapid, uncontrollable muscle movement known as chorea. As the disease progresses, it can lead to loss of control over speech and memory, dementia and death. The gene which causes Huntingtons was discovered nearly 25 years ago, but there is still no cure and relatively limited treatment options.

This is especially true for people living in South America, where prevalence of the disease is almost 1,000 times higher than in the rest of the world and often combined with extreme poverty. Because the disease affects families generationally, they are often caught in a cycle of need.

The meeting with Pope Francis was called HDdennomore (pronounced hidden no more) and put on in special solidarity with South America. Two families from Venezuela, two from Colombia, and one girl from Argentina all affected by the disease in different ways were brought to the Vatican by a humanitarian group to meet the Pope.

Also present at the audience were members of the medical and scientific communities who treat the patients with Huntingtons and perform research on how to prevent the disease or slow its progression.

In total, there were some 1,700 people present from 16 different countries. Seated in the front row were 150 people affected by Huntingtons that each got a personal greeting from Pope Francis, who stayed nearly an hour after the audience concluded in order to greet them all individually.

Jesus never let disease keep him from an encounter with people, but instead taught that every human person is precious and has dignity something no person or illness can erase, the Pope explained.

Brothers and sisters, as you see, you are a large and motivated community, he concluded.

May the life of each of you both those who are directly affected by Huntingtons disease and those who work hard every day to support the sick in their pain and difficulty be a living witness to the hope that Christ has given us, he said, noting that even through suffering there passes a path of abundant good, which we can travel together.

Stressing the value of every human life, the Pope emphasized that no outcome can ever justify the use or destruction of embryos for scientific research even for the commendable cause of trying to help those suffering from incurable diseases.

Some branches of research use human embryos, inevitably causing their destruction. But we know that no ends, even noble in themselves such as a predicted utility for science, for other human beings or for society can justify the destruction of human embryos, he said May 18.

Currently there are several ethical problems surrounding the research on Huntingtons disease, including the use of embryonic stem cells taken from embryos made through in vitro fertilization.

The Pope noted this fact during the audience, encouraging scientists to pursue scientific advancement only through means that do not contribute to the throw-away culture which treats human beings as objects for use.

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Pope Francis to Huntington's patients: You deserve respect and love - Catholic News Agency

Microglia Generation For High-Throughput Experiments Optimized – Technology Networks

By Stell Cell Research

Microglia derived from stem cells. Credit: NYSCF

Scientists from the New York Stem Cell Foundation (NYSCF) Research Institute have developed a robust, efficient method for deriving microglia, the immune cells of the brain, from human stem cells. Microglia are increasingly implicated in neurological disorders including Alzheimers disease, Parkinsons disease and multiple sclerosis, among many others. However, research into the role of human microglia in these disorders has long been hampered by the inability to obtain them from the human nervous system.

This new protocol now enables scientists around the world to generate this critical cell type from individual patients and improve our understanding of the role of microglia neurological malfunction. NYSCFs mission is to bring cures to patients faster, said Susan L. Solomon, CEO and cofounder of NYSCF. One way we work towards this goal is by developing methods and models that lift the entire field of stem cell research. This new protocol is the perfect example of the type of method that will enable researchers around the world to accelerate their work.

Published in Stem Cell Reports, this microglia protocol is optimized for use in high-throughput experiments, such as drug screening and toxicity testing among other large-scale research applications, and has the benefit of allowing such experiments to be carried out on multiple patient samples. The scientists determined that the protocol is robust and reproducible, generating microglia from sixteen induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cell lines, stem cells that are created from individual patients.

Microglia from humans have long been a desired research model, but are difficult to obtain for laboratory experiments. The NYSCF protocol provides a new source of human microglia cells, which can be generated from disease patient samples and will complement studies in mouse models to better understand the role of microglia in health and disease. Microglia generated by the NYSCF protocol will thus provide a critical tool to investigate microglia dysfunction in central nervous system disorders and advance complex disease modeling in a dish.

This article has been republished frommaterialsprovided byNYSCF. Note: material may have been edited for length and content. For further information, please contact the cited source.

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Microglia Generation For High-Throughput Experiments Optimized - Technology Networks

Cancer Immunotherapy May Work in Unexpected Way – Laboratory Equipment

By Stem Cell Medical Center

Antibodies to the proteins PD-1 and PD-L1 have been shown to fight cancer by unleashing the body's T cells, a type of immune cell. Now, researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine have shown that the therapy also fights cancer in a completely different way, by prompting immune cells called macrophages to engulf and devour cancer cells.

The finding may have important implications for improving and expanding the use of this cancer treatment, the researchers said.

A study describing the work, which was done in mice, was published online May 17 in Nature. The senior author is Irving Weissman, MD, professor of pathology and of developmental biology. The lead author is graduate student Sydney Gordon.

PD-1 is a cell receptor that plays an important role in protecting the body from an overactive immune system. T cells, which are immune cells that learn to detect and destroy damaged or diseased cells, can at times mistakenly attack healthy cells, producing autoimmune disorders like lupus or multiple sclerosis. PD-1 is what's called an "immune checkpoint," a protein receptor that tamps down highly active T cells so that they are less likely to attack healthy tissue.

How cancer hijacks PD-1

About 10 years ago, researchers discovered that cancer cells learn to use this immune safeguard for their own purposes. Tumor cells crank up the production of PD-L1 proteins, which are detected by the PD-1 receptor, inhibiting T cells from attacking the tumors. In effect, the proteins are a "don't kill me" signal to the immune system, the Stanford researchers said. Cancer patients are now being treated with antibodies that block the PD-1 receptor or latch onto its binding partner, PD-L1, to turn off this "don't kill me" signal and enable the T cells' attack.

"Using antibodies to PD-1 or PD-L1 is one of the major advances in cancer immunotherapy," said Weissman, who is also the Virginia and D.K. Ludwig Professor for Clinical Investigation in Cancer Research, director of the Stanford Institute for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine and director of the Ludwig Center for Cancer Stem Cell Research and Medicine at Stanford. "While most investigators accept the idea that anti-PD-1 and PD-L1 antibodies work by taking the brakes off of the T-cell attack on cancer cells, we have shown that there is a second mechanism that is also involved."

What Weissman and his colleagues discovered is that PD-1 activation also inhibits the anti-cancer activity of other immune cells called macrophages. "Macrophages that infiltrate tumors are induced to create the PD-1 receptor on their surface, and when PD-1 or PD-L1 is blocked with antibodies, it prompts those macrophage cells to attack the cancer," Gordon said.

Similar to anti-CD47 antibody

This mechanism is similar to that of another antibody studied in the Weissman lab: the antibody that blocks the protein CD47. Weissman and his colleagues showed that using anti-CD47 antibodies prompted macrophages to destroy cancer cells. The approach is now the subject of a small clinical trial in human patients.

As it stands, it's unclear to what degree macrophages are responsible for the therapeutic success of the anti-PD-1 and anti-PD-L1 antibodies.

The practical implications of the discovery could be important, the researchers said. "This could lead to novel therapies that are aimed at promoting either the T-cell component of the attack on cancer or promoting the macrophage component," Gordon said.

Another implication is that antibodies to PD-1 or PD-L1 may be more potent and broadly effective than previously thought. "In order for T cells to attack cancer when you take the brakes off with antibodies, you need to start with a population of T cells that have learned to recognize specific cancer cells in the first place," Weissman said. "Macrophage cells are part of the innate immune system, which means they should be able to recognize every kind of cancer in every patient."

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Cancer Immunotherapy May Work in Unexpected Way - Laboratory Equipment

Basis of ‘leaky’ brain blood vessels in Huntington’s disease identified – UCI News

By Stem Cell Medical Center

Irvine, Calif., May 16, 2017 By using induced pluripotent stem cells to create endothelial cells that line blood vessels in the brain for the first time for a neurodegenerative disease, University of California, Irvine neurobiologists and colleagues have learned why Huntingtons disease patients have defects in the blood-brain barrier that contribute to the symptoms of this fatal disorder.

Now we know there are internal problems with blood vessels in the brain, said study leader Leslie Thompson, UCI professor of psychiatry & human behavior and neurobiology & behavior. This discovery can be used for possible future treatments to seal the leaky blood vessels themselves and to evaluate drug delivery to patients with HD.

The blood-brain barrier protects the brain from harmful molecules and proteins. It has been established that in Huntingtons and other neurodegenerative diseases there are defects in this barrier adding to HD symptoms. What was not known was whether these defects come from the cells that constitute the barrier or are secondary effects from other brain cells.

To answer that, Thompson and colleagues from UCI, Columbia University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Cedars-Sinai Medical Center reprogrammed cells from HD patients into induced pluripotent stem cells, then differentiated them into brain microvascular endothelial cells those that form the internal lining of blood vessels and prevent leakage of blood proteins and immune cells.

The researchers discovered that blood vessels in the brains of HD patients become abnormal due to the presence of the mutated Huntingtin protein, the hallmark molecule linked to the disease. As a result, these blood vessels have a diminished capacity to form new blood vessels and are leaky compared to those derived from control patients.

The chronic production of the mutant Huntingtin protein in the blood vessel cells causes other genes within the cells to be abnormally expressed, which in turn disrupts their normal functions, such as creating new vessels, maintaining an appropriate barrier to outside molecules, and eliminating harmful substances that may enter the brain.

In addition, by conducting in-depth analyses of the altered gene expression patterns in these cells, the study team identified a key signaling pathway known as the Wnt that helps explain why these defects occur. In the healthy brain, this pathway plays an important role in forming and preserving the blood-brain barrier. The researchers showed that most of the defects in HD patients blood vessels can be prevented when the vessels are exposed to a compound (XAV939) that inhibits the activity of the Wnt pathway.

This is the first induced pluripotent stem cell-based model of the blood-brain barrier for a neurodegenerative disease. The study appears in the journal Cell Reports, with a parallel study from Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Cell Stem Cell that advances the first model for a neurodevelopmental disease that specifically affects the blood-brain barrier.

These studies together demonstrate the incredible power of iPSCs to help us more fully understand human disease and identify the underlying causes of cellular processes that are altered, said Ryan Lim, a postgraduate research scientist at the Institute for Memory Impairments and Neurological Disorders, or UCI MIND, who initiated the UCI work.

We show a proof-of-concept therapy where we could reverse some of the abnormalities in the blood vessel cells by treating them with a drug, added Thompson, who is affiliated with both UCI MIND and the Sue & Bill Gross Stem Cell Research Center.

The future direction of this study is to develop ways to test how drugs may be delivered to the brain of HD patients and to examine additional treatment strategies using our understanding of the underlying causes of abnormalities in brain blood vessels, said study co-leader Dritan Agalliu, assistant professor of pathology & cell biology at Columbia University Medical Center.

Chris Quan, Andrea M. Reyes-Ortiz, Jie Wu, Jennifer Stocksdale and Malcolm S. Casale of UCI; Amanda J. Kedaigle, Theresa A. Gipson, Ernest Fraenkel and David E. Housman of MIT; Gad D. Vatine and Clive N. Svendsen of Cedars-Sinai; and Sarah E. Lutz of Columbia University also contributed to the study, which was supported in part by the American Heart Association, California Institute for Regenerative Medicine and National Institutes of Health.

About the University of California, Irvine: Founded in 1965, UCI is the youngest member of the prestigious Association of American Universities. The campus has produced three Nobel laureates and is known for its academic achievement, premier research, innovation and anteater mascot. Led by Chancellor Howard Gillman, UCI has more than 30,000 students and offers 192 degree programs. Its located in one of the worlds safest and most economically vibrant communities and is Orange Countys second-largest employer, contributing $5 billion annually to the local economy. For more on UCI, visit http://www.uci.edu.

Media access: Radio programs/stations may, for a fee, use an on-campus ISDN line to interview UCI faculty and experts, subject to availability and university approval. For more UCI news, visit news.uci.edu. Additional resources for journalists may be found at communications.uci.edu/for-journalists.

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Basis of 'leaky' brain blood vessels in Huntington's disease identified - UCI News

Lab-Grown Blood Stem Cells Produced at Last – Scientific American

By Stem Cell Clinic

After 20 years of trying, scientists have transformed mature cells into primordial blood cells that regenerate themselves and the components of blood. The work, described today inNature, offers hope to people with leukaemia and other blood disorders who need bone-marrow transplants but cant find a compatible donor. If the findings translate into the clinic, these patients could receive lab-grown versions of their own healthy cells.

One team, led by stem-cell biologist George Daley of Boston Childrens Hospital in Massachusetts, created human cells that act like blood stem cells, although they are not identical to those found in nature. A second team, led by stem-cell biologist Shahin Rafii of Weill Cornell Medical College in New York City, turned mature cells from mice into fully fledged blood stem cells.

For many years, people have figured outparts of this recipe, but theyve never quite gotten there, says Mick Bhatia, a stem-cell researcher at McMaster University in Hamilton, Canada, who was not involved with either study. This is the first time researchers have checked all the boxes and made blood stem cells.

Daleys team chose skin cells and other cells taken from adults as their starting material. Using a standard method, they reprogrammed the cells intoinduced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells, which are capable of producing manyother cell types. Until now, however, iPS cells have not been morphed into cells that create blood.

The next step was the novel one: Daley and his colleagues inserted seven transcription factorsgenes that control other genesinto the genomes of the iPS cells. Then they injected these modified human cells into mice to develop. Twelve weeks later, the iPS cells had transformed into progenitor cells capable of making the range of cells found in human blood, including immune cells. The progenitor cells are tantalizingly close to naturally occurring haemopoetic blood stem cells, says Daley.

Bhatia agrees. Its pretty convincing that George has figured out how to cook up human haemopoetic stem cells, he says. That is the holy grail.

By contrast, Rafiis team generated true blood stem cells from mice without the intermediate step of creating iPS cells. The researchers began by extracting cells from the lining of blood vessels in mature mice. They then inserted four transcription factors into the genomes of these cells, and kept them in Petri dishes designed to mimic the environment inside human blood vessels. There, the cells morphed into blood stem cells and multiplied.

When the researchers injected these stem cells into mice that had been treated with radiation to kill most of their blood and immune cells, the animals recovered. The stem cells regenerated the blood, including immune cells, and the mice went on to live a full lifemore than 1.5 years in the lab.

Because he bypassed the iPS-cell stage, Rafii compares his approach to a direct aeroplane flight, and Daleys procedure to a flight that takes a detour to the Moon before reaching its final destination. Using the most efficient method to generate stem cells matters, he adds, because every time a gene is added to a batch of cells, a large portion of the batch fails to incorporate it and must be thrown out. There is also a risk that some cells will mutate after they are modified in the lab, and could form tumours if they are implanted into people.

But Daley and other researchers are confident that the method he used can be made more efficient, and less likely to spur tumour growth and other abnormalities in modified cells. One possibility is to temporarily alter gene expression in iPS cells, rather than permanently insert genes that encode transcription factors, says Jeanne Loring, a stem-cell researcher at the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California. She notes that iPS cells can be generated from skin and other tissue that is easy to access, whereas Rafiis method begins with cells that line blood vessels, which are more difficult to gather and to keep alive in the lab.

Time will determine which approach succeeds. But the latest advances have buoyed the spirits of researchers who have been frustrated by their inability to generate blood stem cells from iPS cells. A lot of people have become jaded, saying that these cells dont exist in nature and you cant just push them into becoming anything else, Bhatia says. I hoped the critics were wrong, and now I know they were.

This article is reproduced with permission and wasfirst publishedon May 17, 2017.

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Lab-Grown Blood Stem Cells Produced at Last - Scientific American

Asymmetrex Named One of the "50 Most Valuable Brands of the Year 2017" by The Silicon Review – Benzinga

By Stem Cell Clinic

Yesterday, when Silicon Valley magazine The Silicon Review announced its 2017 class of 50 Most Valuable Brands, one member, private stem cell biotechnology start-up Asymmetrex, may have seemed an unusual selection. However, the company's unique in silico approach to counting therapeutic tissue stem cells earned it this recognition.

Boston, MA (PRWEB) May 18, 2017

When James Sherley, was notified earlier this year that his company Asymmetrex had been selected as one of the 50 Most Valuable Brands for the Year 2017 by The Silicon Review, he was not surprised as others might be. Sherley says, "I felt like we had been making good progress increasing Asymmetrex's value, but this recognition by Silicon Valley was particularly meaningful. Our selection by The Silicon Review may seem odd to some, but it makes perfect sense to us. We are able to count adult tissue stem cells for the first time, how? By adapting and designing in silico computational simulation techniques to reveal previously unmeasured properties of adult tissue stem cells, like for instance their number!"

Sherley had a theoretical concept for counting tissue stem cells since before he and his collaborators published a 2001 seminal report explaining how the culture of human tissue cells depends on the unique cell production abilities of tissue stem cells. However, implementing and testing his concept would require enlisting computational modeling expertise. Although Sherley was a professor at MIT, during his time there from 1998 to 2007, he was able to entice only one computer science graduate student to work with him on the idea as a half-semester interdisciplinary experience project.

Then Sherley met Frank Abdi, Ph.D. at a biology-mesomechanics integrative conference in Vicenza, Italy in 2011. Abdi is the founder and chief scientist at AlphaSTAR Corporation, a leading global consulting company in the aircraft and aerospace industry. In AlphaSTAR, Abdi had developed an award-winning, proprietary suite of statistical computational software for simulating the complex behavior of composite materials in high mechanical stress crafts like airplanes, racing cars, and space shuttles. Abdi had a long-standing interest in applying these malleable computational tools to problems in medicine. So, it did not take long for Abdi and Sherley to recognize that they were the ideal team to advance Sherley's computational tissue stem cell counting concept to practical use.

With other AlphaSTAR staff, the two began by translating Sherley's biological models into computational code. When Asymmetrex was formed in 2013, the two companies added staff and resources to accelerate their efforts to develop and validate the new counting approach. By the middle of 2016, they had completed development of the AlphaSTEM Test, a working software program validated for counting tissue stem cells in human lung, bone marrow, liver, and amniotic fluid, as well as for detecting tissue stem cell-active compounds like drug candidates. The data input required for the AlphaSTEM Test is easily obtained total cell count data from serial culture of dissociated human tissue cells.

Asymmetrex now markets the AlphaSTEM Test with the computing support of AlphaSTAR. Before the AlphaSTEM Test, there was no method available for counting adult tissue stem cells specifically. Now, it is possible to count tissue stem cells in experiments in research labs; to determine the dose of stem cells in approved stem cell therapies; to determine the quality and dose of stem cells used in private stem cell clinic treatments; to determine stem cell dose for better interpretation of stem cell clinical trial results; to monitor and optimize biomanufacturing processes for therapeutic tissue stem cells; to determine the dose of genetically-engineered stem cells in gene and gene editing therapies; to have earlier screening for stem cell-toxic drugs that fail in clinical trials because of chronic organ failure; to identify environmental toxicants that alter tissue stem cells; and to identify compounds that improve health by positive effects on tissue stem cells.

The many benefits that will flow from now being able to address these many waiting unmet needs and markets are the basis for The Silicon Review's recognition of Asymmetrex's high value in 2017 and beyond.

About Asymmetrex

Asymmetrex, LLC is a Massachusetts life sciences company with a focus on developing technologies to advance stem cell medicine. Asymmetrex's founder and director, James L. Sherley, M.D., Ph.D. is an internationally recognized expert on the unique properties of adult tissue stem cells. The company's patent portfolio contains biotechnologies that solve the two main technical problems production and quantification that have stood in the way of successful commercialization of human adult tissue stem cells for regenerative medicine and drug development. In addition, the portfolio includes novel technologies for isolating cancer stem cells and producing induced pluripotent stem cells for disease research purposes. Currently, Asymmetrex's focus is employing its technological advantages to develop and market facile methods for monitoring adult stem cell number and function in stem cell transplantation treatments and in pre-clinical assays for drug safety.

For the original version on PRWeb visit: http://www.prweb.com/releases/2017/05/prweb14347779.htm

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Asymmetrex Named One of the "50 Most Valuable Brands of the Year 2017" by The Silicon Review - Benzinga

Major ‘Milestone’ Realized in Quest to Transform Stem Cells Into Blood Cells – Seeker

By Embryonic Stem Cells

Scientists on Wednesday unveiled two methods for coaxing stem cells into blood cells, a long-sought goal that could lead to new treatments for blood disease, including leukemia.

In separate experiments reported in Nature one with mice, the other transplanting human stem cells into mouse bone marrow researchers demonstrated techniques with the potential to produce all types of blood cells.

This step opens up an opportunity to take cells from patients with genetic blood disorders, use gene editing to correct their genetic defect, and make functional blood cells, said Ryohichi Sugimura, a doctor at Boston Children's Hospital and lead author of one of the studies.

If proven safe, the proof-of-concept methods could also lead to a limitless supply of blood by using cells from universal donors, he added.

Human embryonic stem cells generic cells which, as the embryo develops, gradually differentiate were first isolated in 1998.

A decade later, scientists figured out how to generate another type of all-purpose cell from human skin, known as induced pluripotent stem cells, or iPS. These were successfully used to make neurons and heart cells.

But the goal of creating blood-forming stem cells in the lab remained out-of-reach.

RELATED: Blood From Human Babies, Teens Rejuvenates Old Mice

Sugimura and colleagues devised a three-step process to achieve that breakthrough.

They began by inducing both embryonic stems cells and iPS to morph into a form of embryonic tissue that in a natural process gives rise to blood stem cells. This had been done before.

In the second crucial step, they experimented with dozens of proteins known to control gene expression, especially during the formative process of embryo growth.

Protein cocktail They found that five of these so-called transcription factors, working together, yielded the elusive blood stem cells the starter kit for white and red blood cells, platelets, macrophages and all the other cell types of which blood is composed.

Finally, they transplanted these human blood stem cells into the bone marrow of live mice.

Within a few weeks, several kinds of human blood cells had formed, and were circulating in the rodents.

We are now able to model human blood function in so-called humanized mice, said George Daley, head of a research lab at Boston Children's Hospital and the main architect of the experiment, in a statement.

We're tantalizingly close to generating bona fide human blood cells in a dish, he added.

In the second study, a team led by Shahin Rafii at Weill Cornell Medicine in New York City used adult mouse cells as their starting material, and then guided them through several steps including exposure to some of the same gene-activating proteins to create mature blood stem cells in a petri dish.

RELATED:Vampire Bats Are Drinking Human Blood in Brazil

Taken together, the two experiments represent a milestone in stem cell development, said Carolina Guibentif and Berthold Gottgens, researchers at the Cambridge Stem Cell Institute in England who did not participate in the work.

The ability to manufacture HSCs haematopoietic, or blood, stem cells in the laboratory holds enormous promise for cell therapy, drug screening and studies of leukaemia development, they wrote in a commentary, also published by Nature.

A key concern, they noted, was the possible risk associated with using transcription factors that may themselves be linked to the early stages of leukemia.

How these cocktails of catalyzing proteins are inserted into developing tissue is of particular concern.

But new techniques of ultra-precise gene-editing, they added, could soon render such potential problems obsolete.

WATCH: How Do Blood Transfusions Work?

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Major 'Milestone' Realized in Quest to Transform Stem Cells Into Blood Cells - Seeker

Let there be tissue: More precise, controlled method of engineering tissues from stem cells – Science Daily

By Embryonic Stem Cells

Science Daily
Let there be tissue: More precise, controlled method of engineering tissues from stem cells
Science Daily
A major promise of studying human embryonic stem cells is to understand these processes and apply the knowledge toward tissue engineering. Researchers in UC Santa Barbara's departments of Chemistry and Biochemistry, and of Molecular, Cellular and ...

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Let there be tissue: More precise, controlled method of engineering tissues from stem cells - Science Daily

No research justifies the use of human embryos, Pope Francis says – Catholic News Agency

By Embryonic Stem Cells

Vatican City, May 18, 2017 / 10:26 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Francis said that there is no outcome that can justify the use or destruction of embryos for scientific purposes even for the commendable cause of trying to help those suffering from incurable diseases.

Some branches of research, in fact, utilize human embryos, inevitably causing their destruction. But we know that no ends, even noble in themselves, such as a predicted utility for science, for other human beings or for society, can justify the destruction of human embryos, he said May 18.

Pope Francis spoke during a meeting at the Vatican Thursday with people affected by a rare and incurable genetic brain disorder called Huntingtons disease, along with their families and caretakers.

His comments were significant given the massive slate of members from the medical and scientific communities who treat the patients with Huntington's and perform research on how to prevent the disease or slow its progression. Present were some 1,700 people from 16 different countries. Sponsors for the event included major corporations such as Virgin Airlines.

There are several ethical problems surrounding the research on Huntingtons disease, including the use of embryonic stem cells taken from embryos made through in vitro fertilization.

The Pope noted this fact during the audience, encouraging scientists to pursue scientific advancement only through means that do not contribute to the throw-away culture which treats human beings as objects for use.

The is not the first time Francis has spoken out against embryonic stem cell research. In his 2015 environment encyclical Laudato Si, he decried a tendency within the field of science to justify transgressing all boundaries when experimentation is carried out on living human embryos.

We forget that the inalienable worth of a human being transcends his or her degree of development, he said, adding that once technology disregards ethical principles, it ends up considering any practice whatsoever as licit.

When we fail to acknowledge as part of reality the worth of a poor person, a human embryo, a person with disabilities to offer just a few examples it becomes difficult to hear the cry of nature itself; everything is connected.

Once the human being seeks absolute dominion, the foundations of our life begin to crumble, the Pope said in Laudato Si, so that instead of cooperating with God, man puts himself in Gods place and thus ends up provoking a rebellion on the part of nature.

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No research justifies the use of human embryos, Pope Francis says - Catholic News Agency

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