NEWS and OPINIONS

Cell Therapy Shows Promise for Severe Lung Condition in Small Trial
by Technology Networks - Biopharma News - Initial trial suggests invariant natural killer cell therapy improves survival. Promising trial results indicate that a new type of cell therapy could improve the prognosis of those who are critically ill with acute...

Ancient viral DNA plays role in early embryo development
By Dr Naomi Phillips - Progress.org - Viral genetic material, integrated into our DNA millions of years ago, has an essential role in a key early stage in embryo development. Using a mouse model, scientists in Spain have shown that endogenous retroviruses, part of the...

Neurona raises $120M to take epilepsy cell therapy to late-stage development
By Kyle LaHucik - Endpoints News Neurona Therapeutics has gathered $120 million in what is expected to be its last private financing round to wrap up an open-label study this year and move its epilepsy cell therapy into a randomized Phase II in 2025, CEO and...

Jennifer Doudna: Delivering the future of CRISPR-based genome editing
by Marni Ellery - Berkley Engineering - Nobel laureate details new applications at Kuh Distinguished Lecture. Jennifer Doudna, Nobel laureate and Li Ka Shing Chancellor’s Chair and Professor in the Departments of Chemistry and of Molecular and Cell Biology, presented...

FDA takes bid to regulate ‘liquid magic’ stem cell treatments to Ninth Circuit
By Edvard Pettersson - Courthouse News Service - The FDA asked the Ninth Circuit to follow their colleagues on the 11th Circuit and find that novel stem cell procedures are not exempt from the agency's oversight. PASADENA, Calif. (CN) — The U.S. Food and Drug...

Staten Island teen flies to Michigan to donate stem cells to a stranger in desperate need
By Dr. Gracelyn Santos - SILive.com Binghamton sophomore and Staten Islander, Hayley Bond, 19, recently traveled to Grand Rapids, Michigan, to donate her stem cells, after being informed she was a match for a leukemia patient, in desperate need of a bone marrow...

Secondary cancers following CAR T cell therapy are rare
By Penn Medicine News - Penn Today - The development of any type of second cancer following CAR T cell therapy is a rare occurrence, as found in an analysis of more than 400 patients treated at Penn Medicine, researchers from the Perelman School of Medicine report in...

Surprisingly simple model explains how brain cells organize and connect
By Matt Wood - University of Chicago Biological Sciences Division - A new study by physicists and neuroscientists from the University of Chicago, Harvard and Yale describes how connectivity among neurons comes about through general principles of networking and...

An Italian Town Full of the Elderly Wants to Feel Young Again
By Jason Horowitz - New York Times - As the traveling brass band ended San Giovanni Lipioni’s annual holiday concert with a rendition of Wham’s “Last Christmas,” the gray-haired villagers seated in the old church of the central Italian hill town gazed dotingly at the...
Japan approves new stem cell-based Alzheimer’s therapy
By Phoebe Shields - Proactive - In what could be a major breakthrough for Alzheimer's treatment, the Japanese Ministry of Health and Welfare has given the greenlight to a regenerative medicine technology based on administering fat-derived stem cells intravenously and...

New Mayo Clinic stem cell research to take flight into space
By Lynda De Widt - Mayo Clinic - A Mayo Clinic research experiment will be part of a payload that launches into space from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, on Jan. 29, subject to weather conditions and other factors. The research team from the...

World’s first IVF rhino pregnancy ‘could save species’
By Rebecca Morelle and Alison Francis - BBC News Science - A fertility breakthrough has offered hope for saving the northern white rhino from extinction - there are only two of the animals left on the planet. Scientists have achieved the world's first IVF rhino...