Date: 2015-04-09
Type of information: Grant
Company: Neostem (USA - NY)
Investors: California Institute of Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) (USA - CA)
Amount: $1 million
Funding type: grant
Planned used: Under the $4 million grant made to the University of California, Irvine, NeoStem is entitled, through a subaward, to $1 million of new funds adding to the original $0.5 million awarded . The goals of the research are to generate three-dimensional retinal tissue, to investigate the ability of adult induced pluripotent stem cells to restore sight in rodent models of retinal degeneration and to make eventual preparations for clinical use of the tissue. The grant supports a three-year study led by Dr. Hans S. Keirstead, President of NeoStem Oncology, and Dr. Magdalene J. Seiler, Project Scientist V at the University of California, Irvine and its Sue & Bill Gross Stem Cell Research Center. In the first year of the study, NeoStem fulfilled its primary goal of reproducibly generating retinal pigment epithelium (RPE) and layered retinal progenitor tissue, which include progenitors of the major retinal cell types including photoreceptors. This success enables the rest of the study, which will focus on transplantation and testing of these tissues in rodent models of retinal degeneration.
Others: * On April 9, 2015, NeoStem, a biopharmaceutical company developing novel cell based personalized medicine therapies, announced the extension of its study for retinal disease under a 2014 Early Translational grant from the California Institute of Regenerative Medicine for research leading to the development of a treatment for retinal diseases, including macular degeneration and retinitis pigmentosa.
Therapeutic area: Ophtalmalogical diseases - Genetic diseases - Rare diseases
