CIRM video journal of the World Stem Cell Summit

The World Stem Cell Summit is going on now in Pasadena. This is the primary meeting for pulling together scientists and patient advocates to talk about progress in the field.

CIRM has transformed our booth into a mini recording studio to film interviews with advocates and scientists at the meeting. They talk about the importance of advocates spreading the word, what they hope to learn from the meeting and what they think all people should know about the field. Here's the first batch of videos:

Jonathan Thomas, Chair of the CIRM governing board: What do you want all people at this meeting to know about CIRM?

I don't think there's a real comprehensive feel for the fact that we are engaged in research going after 26 different diseases.

Keri Kimler, Vice President for Texans for Stem Cell Research: What is the reception to your message about the power of stem cell research in Texas?

There's a lot of misconception. I think that we do everything we can to educate on the true purpose of the research and that's to find solutions to unmet needs and to find cures and to find new treatments and I think that that usually works very well.

Roman Reed, Roman Reed Spinal Cord Injury Research Act: Is there something all advocates should learn and take home from the meeting?

It's incumbent on all of us to get the message out there because when you really know about stem cell research you know it's the right thing to do. What's wrong with trying to help the suffering?

Laurel Barchas, PhD candidate at UC Berkeley: Is there a point about stem cell research that you think all people should take away from this meeting?

What's striking about this conference is that I've met people who are working in law, working to educate people, working to educate patients, patient advocates. All of these people are coming together with the common goal of advancing stem cell research. No matter what you are interested in you can use your talents to push this research forward.

Don Reed, Vice President for the Americans for Cures Foundation: Is there a message that all patient advocates should go home and tell their friends and family members?

Get involved. There's so many opportunities for patient advocates to get involved. Everybody knows somebody with a disease or disability for whom the doctors have said there's no chance, there's no hope.

Judy Roberson, past president of the Huntington's Disease Society of America: Is there some important role you think advocates play at this meeting?

I feel like patient advocates get a lot from listening to the hopeful messages and I think they get encouraged by hearing our personal stories about how Huntington's disease as effected my family and that we are very hopeful about stem cell research.

First patient from Geron spinal cord injury trial speaks up

A story by Rob Stein at the Washington Post is reporting that the first patient to participate in Geron's groundbreaking embryonic stem cell-based trial for spinal cord injury has come forward.

This is both exciting news and no news. It's exciting because scientists and people living with spinal cord injury and their families are all watching this trial closely. Any news is of interest. However, at this point it's too soon to know if the cells have been effective.

For those who haven't been following this story, Geron is conducting a trial in which they inject primitive neural cells derived from embryonic stem cells into the region surrounding a recent spinal cord injury. In work with rodents conducted by CIRM grantee Hans Keirstead at the University of California, Irvine, the cells were able to restore movement to the hind limbs after an injury. (As an aside, that earliest work was conducted through funds from the Roman Reed Spinal Cord Injury Research Act, which is currently being debated by the state.)

The first patient was Timothy J. Atchison of Chatom, Ala. According to the Washington Post:

Atchison, known as T.J. to his family and friends, was a student at the University of South Alabama College of Nursing when his car crashed on Sept. 25, which, Atchison noted, was the birthday of Christopher Reeve, the actor who suffered a devastating spinal cord injury.

After undergoing emergency treatment at a regional medical center, Atchison was transferred to the Shepherd Center in Atlanta, which specializes in spinal cord injuries, for rehabilitation. It was there that he agreed to let doctors inject him with the drug — more than 2 million cells made from stem cells into his spine, he said.

Like all initial trials in the U.S., this one is primarily testing whether the cells are safe, but of course it is also being closely watched for signs that the cells were effective (read more from the NIH about phases of a clinical trial). It's too soon for scientists to know whether the injected cells are able to help repair damage after spinal cord injury such as the one Atchison suffered after his car crashed.

Geron intends to test the cells on 10 people at seven sites around the country, of which Stanford University recently announced it was one. The Washington Post describes the procedure:

Surgeons planned to use specially designed equipment to infuse into the first patient’s spine about 2 million “oligodendrocyte progenitor” cells, which Geron scientists had created in the laboratory from embryonic stem cells obtained from days-old embryos left over from fertility treatments. The hope is that the cells will form a restorative sheath around the damaged spinal cord. In tests in hundreds of rats, partially paralyzed animals regained the ability to move, according to Geron.

The Geron trial isn't the only approach to using stem cells to treat spinal cord injury, though it is the first to clinical trial. Here's a list of CIRM grantees working on other approaches, including some using adult, embryonic or reprogrammed iPS cells.

A.A.

Clinical Trial of Hope at Stanford -- guest blogger Roman Reed

Under the direction of Dr. Gary Steinberg, an advance long considered impossible is moving forward today: Stanford announced yesterday that it will participate in Geron's human clinical safety trials for a novel treatment for spinal cord injury. These are safety trials to be sure and not efficacy trials, more tests will need to be run, but this is already farther along than ever before.

To understand what this means to me, jump back in time…

Eight years ago, I held in my hand a paralyzed rat.

As I sat there in a wheelchair paralyzed from a spinal cord injury, holding this rat in wonderment, awe and jealousy, my mind barely comprehended that this rat was actually moving. His formerly paralyzed legs pushed strongly against my hands, trying to get away from my grasp. (A video of a rat from that test is available here.) His coat full and healthy, meaning he had no pain. This rat was the tangible realization of a seemingly impossible dream: to cure paralysis.

This was the pioneer rat of what would become the world’s first human embryonic stem cell clinical trials: the “Geron Trials”.

That rat walked because of Dr. Hans Keirstead at the University of California, Irvine Reeve-Irvine Research Center, whose brilliance is matched only by his courage and determination. Nearly everyone denied him funding initially, because his experiment was ‘too far reaching”. But he would not quit.

This rat was also walking again, because California’s Roman Reed Spinal Cord Injury Research Act of 1999 provided Keirstead the initial funding for this Pioneering Research! (CIRM has since funded Keirstead's follow-up research with a Comprehensive award.)

The first human clinical trials for hESCR treatment were accomplished because of Geron Corp. Geron is literally footing the bill: risking their financial backbone to advance the field. It is to be hoped they will be richly rewarded for such fiscal courage.

These trials of hope through stem cells are being overseen by Stanford’s brilliant Dr. Gary Steinberg and Dr. Steve McKenna of San Jose Valley Medical Center.

Stanford is committed to the cause of cure; and there too, I can speak from personal experience—because Dr. Steinberg is the founder and director of the Stanford Partnership for Spinal Cord Injury and Repair.

One day, I hope to fulfill the late great Christopher “Superman” Reeve’s prediction, that:

“One day, Roman and I will stand up from our wheelchairs, and walk away from them forever.”

Cure did not come in time for our great champion, but I believe he is smiling down on us this day, as Stanford, California, and the world take one leap toward the fulfillment of his dream.

Be mindful, this is just the beginning…



- Roman Reed is the namesake of the Roman Reed Spinal Cord Injury Research Act passed in California. As a result, more than $12.5 million in state funds has been awarded to scientists conducting research in spinal cord regeneration. An additional $50 million has been leveraged from outside sources.

Here is additional information about CIRM's spinal cord injury funding.