Company, University Share Stem Cell Research Funds

Aileen Anderson and Brian Cummings (Daniel Anderson, UC Irvine)

Researchers at StemCells Inc. in Newark, California and University of California in Irvine will share a $20 million award from the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) to conduct research on stem cells leading to clinical trials to treat cervical spinal cord injury. The grant was one of several awards announced last week by CIRM, California’s agency that funds research on stem cell therapies.

The award will provide funding for up to four years, leading to an investigational new drug application with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for StemCells’ drug candidate HuCNS-SC to treat cervical spinal cord injury. The grant supports preclinical studies to prepare for clinical testing of the drug.

The award will be shared by UC Irvine’s Aileen Anderson and Brian Cummings, associate professors of physical medicine and rehabilitation at UC Irvine (pictured right). Anderson’s laboratory has a history of collaboration with StemCells Inc. in spinal cord injury, including studies that led to the world’s first clinical trial for a neural stem cell therapeutic in chronic spinal cord injury.

“Our therapeutic approach,” says Anderson, “is based on the hypothesis that transplanted human neural stem cells integrate into the injured spinal cord to repair the protective myelin sheath and spinal circuitry.” Anderson and Cummings earlier showed that that transplanting human neural stem cells — a technology developed by StemCells Inc. — with thoracic spinal cord injury could restore mobility in rodents. An early stage clinical trial of HuCNS-SC for thorasic spinal cord injury is now underway in Switzerland.

Some 10,000 to 12,000 spinal cord injuries occur each year, with about a quarter of a million Americans now living with spinal cord injuries, costing nearly $4 billion each year. Spinal cord injuries severely impair the movement, sensation, and autonomic function of otherwise healthy people. Recovery from spinal cord injury is often limited, even after aggressive emergency intervention with steroids and surgery, followed by rehabilitation.

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• Stem Cells Repair Heart Muscle in Clinical Trial

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