Management of externally manufactured cell therapy products: the Mayo Clinic approach.

Background: The rise of investigative and commercially available cell therapy products adds a new dynamic to academic medical centers; that is, the management of patient-specific cell products. The scope of cell therapy has rapidly expanded beyond in-house collection and infusion of cell products such as bone marrow and peripheral blood transplant. The complexities and volumes of cell therapies are likely to continue to become more demanding.

Th17-inducing autologous dendritic cell vaccination promotes antigen-specific cellular and humoral immunity in ovarian cancer patients.

In ovarian cancer (OC), IL-17-producing T cells (Th17s) predict improved survival, whereas regulatory T cells predict poorer survival. We previously developed a vaccine whereby patient-derived dendritic cells (DCs) are programmed to induce Th17 responses to the OC antigen folate receptor alpha (FRα). Here we report the results of a single-arm open-label phase I clinical trial designed to determine vaccine safety and tolerability (primary outcomes) and recurrence-free survival (secondary outcome).

Mesenchymal stromal cells protect human cardiomyocytes from amyloid fibril damage.

Background Aims: Light chain (AL) amyloidosis is a protein misfolding disease characterized by extracellular deposition of immunoglobulin light chains (LC) as amyloid fibrils. Patients with LC amyloid involvement of the heart have the worst morbidity and mortality. Current treatments target the plasma cells to reduce further production of amyloid proteins.

Global gene expression profiling of pancreatic islets in mice during streptozotocin-induced β-cell damage and pancreatic Glp-1 gene therapy.

Streptozotocin (STZ), a glucosamine-nitrosourea compound, has potent genotoxic effects on pancreatic β-cells and is frequently used to induce diabetes in experimental animals. Glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) has β-cell protective effects and is known to preserve β-cells from STZ treatment. In this study, we analyzed the mechanisms of STZ-induced diabetes and GLP-1-mediated β-cell protection in STZ-treated mice.

Reprogrammed keratinocytes from elderly type 2 diabetes patients suppress senescence genes to acquire induced pluripotency.

Nuclear reprogramming enables patient-specific derivation of induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells from adult tissue. Yet, iPS generation from patients with type 2 diabetes (T2D) has not been demonstrated. Here, we report reproducible iPS derivation of epidermal keratinocytes (HK) from elderly T2D patients.