Organ Regeneration?

[woodyvoinche]

:whip3: There is an interesting article on Therapeutic Cloning and Telomerase...by Dr. Michael West in the November issue of LIFE EXTENSION magazine... www.lef.org ...as a technology for rejuvenating diseased organs.

The use of adult stem cells and cell culturing and the injecting of these into damaged tissue
has been addressed in other media outlets. The company Bioheart
Inc...www.bioheartinc.com...
has been involved in clinical trials in Europe...extracting part of a
heart
patient's thigh muscle...
concentrating immature muscle cells...and injecting them back into
damaged
hearts of the patient...


Other reports of adult stem cells from blood, umbilical cord blood,
etc...and the abilitiy of these to
transform into insulin producing cells, regeneration of nerve , lung,
liver, skin, etc...

And the work of Dr. J. Vacanti in tissue engineering and his isolation
of
"sporelike cells" or adult
stem cells out of diabetic pancreas and sheep lung and the regeneration
of
the lung after part of
it had been cut out...DISCOVER magazine, July
2001...... http://www.pbs.org/saf/1107/features/body.htm ...
also this
scientific american site...... http://www.sciam.com/mastertech/langer.pdf .....
It would be interesting to know what other clinical trials are occurring
in Europe and other countries
in this area...

woody voinche

 

[waltky]

Drug to fix DNA gets go-ahead...

Drug to fix faulty DNA gets go-ahead in landmark move that may alter medicine forever
2 November 2012 | Gene therapy drug given green light for rare disease; Glybera to cost £1m ($1.6m) for each patient; Drug is first to get approval in Western world; EU go-ahead paves way for many more treatments

Regulators yesterday approved the first therapy in the western world that can correct errors in a person’s genetic code. Europe has approved Glybera to be used against a rare inherited disorder which disrupts fat production in the body. The treatment uses a virus to counteract LPLD, lipoprotein lipase deficiency, which can led to acute inflammation of the pancreas.

The illness affects around one or two people per million and sufferers have damaged copies of a gene which is essential for breaking down fats. The virus infects muscle cells with a copy of a healthy gene and a one-off treatment is effective. The treatment was backed by an advisory panel to the European Commission in July and full approval was granted yesterday. The medicine should be available next year.

Professor John Kastelein, of the University of Amsterdam, said the therapy would have a ‘dramatic impact’ on patients. Only two other gene therapies have previously been approved for sale, both in China. It will cost around £1 million ($1.6 million) per patient, a new record for pricey modern medicines.

Joern Aldag, chief executive of Amsterdam-based uniQure, said more such treatments would follow and argued a high price was justified because gene therapy restored natural body function and was not just a short-term fix. 'This provides higher benefit to patients than the classical protein replacement strategy and this is why we think we should be fairly and adequately compensated,' he said in a telephone interview on Friday

Read more: First gene therapy drug given European license | Mail Online