Search Immortality Topics:

Page 10«..9101112..2030..»


Category Archives: Stem Cells

"Comfort News" for California's Stem Cell Research Effort

The California stem cell agency has
enjoyed a spate of good financial and scientific news this week from
the biotech industry as the research effort pushes on with its
mission of turning stem cells into cures.
The $3 billion agency is
scheduled to make its last grants in less than three years and, given
the glacial pace of medical research, needs all the help it can get
by then to bring a stem cell therapy close to the marketplace – the
promise it made to voters when the agency was created nine years ago.
CIRM, as the agency is known, requires
not only steady scientific progress but also a rosy outlook for the
industry, which has languished in past years as major investors
shunned the field. This week, CIRM garnered good news on both fronts.
There was enough so that the agency
even touted it on the agency's research blog in an item by
Neil Littman, CIRM's business development officer. He said it all
helps to leverage CIRM investments and create a favorable investment climate. The good news included yesterday's announcement that
Viacyte, Inc., of San Diego, Ca., has come up with $10.6
million needed to match a $10.1 million, much-ballyhooed award from CIRM last fall. The Viacyte financing
includes important support from Big Pharma, in the form of Johnson &
Johnson
. CIRM has pumped a total of $39.4 million into Viacyte.
Another CIRM award winner,
Cellular Dynamics International, Inc., of Madison, Wisc., yesterday
announced its price on its upcoming stock offering to raise up to $53
million. Cellular Dynamics scored $16 million from the agency last
March.
The “comfort news” for CIRM also included Monday's announcement that Capricor, Inc., a private Beverly Hills company benefiting from $27 million from the California stem cell agency, is merging with publicly traded Niles Therapeutic, Inc., of San Mateo. The merger is aimed at providing better access to capital.
And then there was Tuesday's news that a $20 million CIRM disease team award is paying off with the beginning of a clinical trial by Calimmune of Tucson, Az. for an HIV treatment.
All on top of the news in June when bluebird bio of Masschusetts brought in $101 million on its stock offering. Bluebird is the recipient of a $9.4 million CIRM award.
The rosy news comes amid a generally
better outlook for biotech in general. John Carroll, editor of Fierce
Biotech,
 this week noted that there were only 11 biotech stock offerings last
year. He wrote,

“In the last 6 months, though, the
industry has seen a tremendous rebound, with almost twice that number
of IPOs in half the time. And there's no sign that the great leap
into the public market is waning, with 10 more IPOs in the queue.”

Carroll's comments were echoed in a
piece by Peter Winter on Bioworld headlined “Bubbleology and Biotech's Bull Run.”
All of this plays into what some might
call the “everybody's-doing-it dance" or the “lemming
syndrome,” depending on your point of view. The reality is that
big investors and venture capitalists are timid souls and need the
comfort of companionship-in-risk as they fork over tens or hundreds
of millions of dollars on something that may not pay off for a decade
or more. No one wants to be the out-front pioneer who winds up with
financial arrows in his or her back. Being in a crowd provides an
illusion of safety.
Of course, there is always the caveat
about how markets and investors are fickle. A piece of bad news can
translate quickly into major reversals as Apple has learned over the
last year. Nonetheless, the folks at the stem cell agency have to  be feeling good today.

Source:
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/blogspot/uqpFc/~3/g8tqW1ynaMw/comfort-news-for-californias-stem-cell.html

Posted in Stem Cell Therapy, Stem Cells | Comments Off on "Comfort News" for California's Stem Cell Research Effort

Pay-for-Eggs Legislation: Strange Bedfellows and Existential Questions

 The California pay-for-eggs bill
today generated a feature article that said the legislation has
“sparked an unusual lineup of partisans on both sides and resonates
far beyond” the Golden State.
The piece by Alex Mathews on Capitol
Weekly
, a news service specializing in California government and
political coverage, said,

“(C)omplicating the issue is
California’s role as a national leader in stem cell research, the
existential question of who or what constitutes a research subject,
and finally, the fact that compensation for fertility purposes is and
has been legal for years in California.”

Mathews was writing about the measure
(AB926) by Assemblywoman Susan Bonilla, D-Concord, that removes a ban
in California on paying women for eggs for scientific research.
Currently women can be paid in California for providing eggs for IVF.
The measure would not alter a ban on compensation for eggs in
research financed by the $3 billion California stem cell agency.
However, later this month, the agency will consider modifying its position somewhat.
The bill has passed the legislature and
is on its way to Gov. Jerry Brown. The industry association
sponsoring the bill expects the governor to sign it later this month
although the governor, as a general rule, does not make public
commitments on legislation.
Mathews' article covered the background
and arguments on the bill and noted that it has received little
mainstream media attention.
Lisa Ikemoto
UC Davis photo
She also quoted Lisa Ikemoto, a law
professor and bioethicist at UC Davis, on the sensitive nature of the
issue. Ikemoto said,

“On the fertility side, it’s
politically hard to touch because it’s all around family formation.
Nobody wants to restrict family formation. On the research side, when
the issue of payment for eggs came up, it was connected with human
embryonic stem cell research, and human embryonic stem cell research
was politicized from the outset.”

Mathews also wrote about the strange
bedfellows opposing the bill. She said,

“Groups that fundamentally oppose
stem cell research such as the California Catholic Conference and
other pro-life groups are natural opponents of the bill, but they are
joined by a number of pro-choice groups who expressed concerns over
the limited research on the effects of egg donation on women’s
health.”

Source:
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/blogspot/uqpFc/~3/pskHpPceyco/pay-for-eggs-legislation-strange.html

Posted in Stem Cell Therapy, Stem Cells | Comments Off on Pay-for-Eggs Legislation: Strange Bedfellows and Existential Questions

California Stem Cell Merger: Capricor and Niles Therapeutics

Capricor, Inc., a Beverly Hills company
benefiting from $27 million from the California stem cell agency,
this week announced that it is merging with Niles Therapeutic, Inc.,
of San Mateo.
Linda Marban
Capricor photo
The Capricor story and its treatment
for heart disease have been highlighted (see here and here) by the $3
billion state research agency, which is partially funding a clinical
trial for the firm. The firm sprang from work by Eduardo Marban of
Cedars-Sinai in Los Angeles, one of Capricor's founders. He received
$6.9 million for his early and current work. Capricor was awarded
$19.8 million more.
Capricor, a privately held firm, and
the publicly traded Niles announced on Monday that they were merging.
The new company will be known as Capricor Therapeutics, Inc., and will
be based in San Mateo.
The new firm will be publicly traded
with Capricor CEO Linda Marban as the new CEO.
The new board of directors will have
two members from Niles and seven from Capricor, including its
executive chairman, Frank Litvack, who was an unsuccessful candidate for chairman of the stem cell agency board in 2011.
The merger press release said that the
new company “should
have better access to capital, more potential for steady pipeline
development and more risk diversification."
On completion of the merger, a joint
press release said,

Nile
will issue to Capricor stockholders shares of Nile common stock such
that Capricor stockholders will own approximately 90% of the combined
company's outstanding shares, and Nile stockholders will own
approximately 10%, calculated in each case on a fully-diluted basis
assuming the issuance of shares underlying options and warrants.
Options of Capricor will be assumed by Nile and become options to
acquire stock of Nile.”

Linda Marban said,

"Capricor's
and Nile's product portfolios complement each other well, as our
therapies will address both the underlying causes and debilitating
effects of heart disease. Capricor's CDCs are allogeneic cardiac
derived stem cells that aim to attenuate and potentially improve
damage to the heart that can result in heart failure, while Nile's
cenderitide is intended to treat patients following hospital
discharge from an acute episode of heart failure."

Niles' stock price stood at $0.04
recently. Its 52 week high was $0.20 and the 52-week low was $0.02.

Source:
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/blogspot/uqpFc/~3/qqVK630tSl0/california-stem-cell-merger-capricor.html

Posted in Stem Cell Therapy, Stem Cells | Comments Off on California Stem Cell Merger: Capricor and Niles Therapeutics

HIV Clinical Trial Hailed by California Stem Cell Agency

The
California stem cell agency today scored what it called an “important
milestone” with the announcement of the start of a clinical trial
involving a therapy to help protect persons infected with HIV from
the effects of the virus.
The
trial is partially funded from a $20 million award from the stem cell
agency, which is known as CIRM, to researchers
at UCLA and Calimmune, a Tucson, Az.,
company. Calimmune's share of the award was $8.2 million.
Alan
Trounson
, president of the $3 billion state agency, said in a
statement,

CIRM
funding of this Phase l/ll trial is an important milestone for us.
One of our goals is to support research that moves the most promising
science out of the lab and into clinical trials in people. To be able
to do that with a disease as devastating as HIV/AIDS highlights the
importance of our funding and the potential impact it could have on
the health of people around the world.”

The
trial was announced by Calimmune this morning. The company said,

The
first patient has begun treatment in a Phase I/II clinical trial
designed to determine whether a pioneering genetic medicine approach
can help to protect individuals infected with HIV from the effects of
the virus. The study, “
Safety
Study of a Dual Anti-HIV Gene Transfer Construct to Treat HIV-1
Infection
,”
utilizes a gene medicine called Cal-1, developed in the lab of Nobel
Laureate Dr. 
David
Baltimore
 and
by Calimmune.”

Baltimore
served on the CIRM board from 2004 until June 6, 2007. He 
resigned
from the board 
about
18 months before the application process began for the grant round
that ultimately funded Calimmune, a company he helped to found. He is currently chairman of the Calimmune board. 
Asked
for comment, Jeff Sheehy, a member of the CIRM governing
board and communications director for AIDS research at UC San
Francisco
, said,

"This
trial will hopefully offer several important insights into the safety
and feasibility of genetically modifying blood forming stem cells in
an HIV patient as a potential therapy.  We are very early in
this research, and with this Phase I trial's goal of establishing
safety and the risks involved, I applaud the courage and altruism
demonstrated by the patients who are willing to participate in this
study."

The Calimmune
press release
 said
the principal investigators on the clinical trial are 
Ron
Mitsayasu
 of
UCLA and 
Jacob
P. Lalezari
 of Quest
Clinical Research
 of
San Francisco. Quest is currently soliciting patients for the
clinical trial as well as UCLA. (Persons interested in participating
in the trial can find email contacts 
at
this website
.
Twelve are needed.)
The
principal investigators on the CIRM award are Irvin Chen of
UCLA and Geoff Symonds of Calimmune.  

Here are links to the CIRM press release on the subject and the agency's blog item.

(An earlier version of this story did not include the fact that Calimmune's share of the CIRM award was $8.2 million or the links to the agency press release and blog.)

Source:
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/blogspot/uqpFc/~3/Zot_z3D2WnI/hiv-clinical-trial-hailed-by-california.html

Posted in Stem Cell Therapy, Stem Cells | Comments Off on HIV Clinical Trial Hailed by California Stem Cell Agency

Eggs and Cash: Stem Cell Agency Considering Easing Restrictions on Stem Cell Lines Derived Using Payments

The California stem cell agency is
moving to remove an absolute ban on use of stem cell lines derived
from eggs from women who have been paid to provide them.
The action comes as state legislation
is headed for Gov. Jerry Brown's desk that would permit payments for
eggs to be used in research that is not funded by the agency. The measure (AB926) would not alter the separate ban on egg payments
involving research funded by the $3 billion stem cell agency.
Under a proposal that will come before the agency's standards group July 24, CIRM's governing board could
approve the use of stem cell lines derived as a result of payment to
women. Board action would be based on whether stem cell lines would
“advance CIRM's mission” and would follow a staff evaluation
involving scientific and ethical issues.
Over recent years, stem cell
researchers around the country have reported that they are not able
to obtain sufficient eggs without payment. And earlier this year,
paid egg providers were used in research in Oregon that cloned human stem cells, a feat that researchers have struggled with for years.
A CIRM staff report said that the
Oregon research has “generated scientific interest among CIRM
grantees and the desire to utilize derived SCNT lines. CIRM’s
current policy prohibits the use of the (Oregon) SCNT lines because
oocyte donors were financially compensated. CIRM requests the Medical
and Ethical Standards Working Group (SWG) revaluate this prohibition
with regard to CIRM grantees ability to utilize the resulting lines
in light of recent scientific and policy developments.”
Last month, the California Stem Cell
Report
queried the agency concerning earlier, sketchy information onthe CIRM blog about a possible change in its compensation rules. We
asked whether the agency was considering “sidestepping” the ban
on compensation. Kevin McCormack, a CIRM spokesman, said, “No, not
at all.” He said it would be premature to elaborate until a firm
proposal was ready.
The staff proposal to be considered on
July 24 said,

“Proposition 71’s 'prohibition on
compensation' compels the ICOC(the agency's governing board) to adopt
standards 'prohibiting compensation to research donors.' This
requirement has been consistently interpreted to prohibit the use of
CIRM funds to financially compensate oocyte (or other cell or tissue)
donors. In 2006, this interpretation was extended to exclude from
use, in CIRM-funded research, any stem cell line where research
donors were financially compensated, even if the derivation was done
without the use of CIRM funds. Proposition 71, however, does not
compel the ICOC (the agency's governing board) to prohibit the use of
stem cell lines where financial compensation is provided to the
oocyte donors, provided that CIRM funds are not used to compensate
the donors or derive the lines.”

The July 24 meeting will be held in San
Francisco. No remote teleconference locations have been announced.  If approved, the changes would likely be considered July 25 by the full agency board.

Source:
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/blogspot/uqpFc/~3/BF3kpSRnKXQ/eggs-and-cash-stem-cell-agency.html

Posted in Stem Cell Therapy, Stem Cells | Comments Off on Eggs and Cash: Stem Cell Agency Considering Easing Restrictions on Stem Cell Lines Derived Using Payments

California Legislation Removing Ban on Payments for Eggs for Research Heads to Governor

Legislation to allow women in
California to be paid for their eggs for scientific research is on
its way to Gov. Jerry Brown following final legislative approval last
week.
Sponsors of the bill, a national
fertility industry organization, expect the governor later this month
to sign the measure, which would go into effect next year.
The measure, AB 926 by Assemblywoman
Susan Bonilla, D-Concord, would repeal a ban on payments to women who
provide eggs for scientific research. However, the measure would not
affect the ban on payments to egg providers in research funded by the
$3 billion California stem cell agency. That ban is covered by a
separate legal provision. Stem cell researchers around the country have complained that they they cannot get eggs without payment.
Women in California can be paid for
providing eggs for reproductive purposes. According to a legislative analysis, payments can run as high as $50,000 for women with special
characteristics but average around $9,000 for each session, which can
generate more than one egg.
The sponsor of the legislation is the
American Society for Reproductive Medicine of Alabama, whose members
represent a wide swath of the $5 billion-a-year fertility business.
The measure would open new business avenues for the industry.
Bonilla argues that the measure allows women to be treated on the same footing as men who provide sperm for
research and would encourage more research into reproductive health issues.
Opponents argue that the safety of the
egg production procedures has not been well-established including
their long-term impact. They also argue that allowing payment would
lead to exploitation of poor and minority women.
The bill received its final
legislative approval on July 1 when the Senate passed it on a 24-9
vote.

Source:
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/blogspot/uqpFc/~3/2FyX5YnnQHA/california-legislation-removing-ban-on.html

Posted in Stem Cell Therapy, Stem Cells | Comments Off on California Legislation Removing Ban on Payments for Eggs for Research Heads to Governor