An embryonic stem-cell therapy developed by a UC Irvine-led research team was recently approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for clinical trial in patients with acute spinal cord injury. The treatment will be the world’s first embryonic stem-cell treatment created for testing in humans.
‘This trial was approved only after rigorous safety testing and consultation of countless experts in the field,’ said Hans Keirnstead, lead researcher and co-director of the UC Irvine Sue and Bill Gross Stem-Cell Research Center. ‘Any benefit to the patient, even an incremental one, would be a resounding victory.’
Keirnstead developed a technique that prompts human embryonic stem cells to develop into oligodendrocyte cells. Paralysis results when these cells, the building blocks of myelin, are damaged or stripped away due to injury or disease.
In 2005, the treatment was successful in reversing the paralysis of rats when Keirnstead and his colleagues injected them with the precursor embryonic stem cells. These cells wrapped around damaged neurons in the spinal cord, forming new myelin tissue and allowing the rats to walk again. The findings were published in the Journal of Neuroscience and were the subject of a ’60 Minutes’ episode.
‘This is the first step along a road that we’re soon going to see turn into a race track,’ Keirnstead said.