Adult stem/progenitor cells repair of damaged brain, pancreas, kidney cells newly ...( The scientists could still see cells...)

The scientists could still see cells after a month in the mice with diabetes - but not in normal mice that had received similar injections. The scientists were especially surprised and pleased to see that the stem/progenitor cells also engrafted into the kidney of the mice with the diabetes-like disease. In the kidney, the human stem/progenitor cells appeared to repair the microscopic damage that usually occurs in diabetes.

Dr. Prockop believes these results suggest possible new treatments for people with diabetes - there would be no problem getting healthy stem cells from their bone marrow and especially for the 8 million people in the United States alone whose worsening diabetes is causing kidney failure.

Dr. Prockop also is pleased that the studies are explaining the mechanisms by which the cells work, in animals and in the more than 1,000 cardiovascular and other patients in the United States believed to be enrolled in clinical trials using these cells taken from their bone marrow. For such patients, the experimental treatment is their only option, but as the treatments are made available to larger numbers of people across a variety of different diseases it will be increasingly necessary to proceed carefully, says Dr. Prockop, and good basic science research will be critical. The Tulane Center for Gene Therapy is the only National Institutes of Health-designated center to distribute human stem cells (taken from healthy volunteers who give small samples of bone marrow from which to clone the cells) and from mice. Currently more than 270 scientists in the United States and other countries are working with the Tulane cells, meaning that research studies all are using well-standardized cells.