Publications by authors named "Meera Srikanthan"

Article Synopsis
  • Dyskeratosis congenita/telomere biology disorders (DC/TBD) often lead to bone marrow failure, and although allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplant (alloHCT) can help, traditional conditioning methods can cause significant toxicity.
  • A clinical trial compared the outcomes of reduced intensity conditioning (RIC) alloHCT to a prior trial that included total body irradiation (TBI) in patients with DC/TBD, focusing on less toxic methods to ensure successful engraftment.
  • While both groups demonstrated comparable outcomes in acute and chronic graft-versus-host disease and no primary graft failures, the non-TBI cohort showed slower donor chimerism achievement, indicating a balance between conditioning intensity and patient safety.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Acute kidney injury (AKI) is common after hematopoietic cell transplantation (HCT) and is associated with poorer outcomes. Risk factors for AKI after pediatric HCT are not fully understood. The study objective was to assess unique risk factors for AKI in the HCT population and evaluate post-HCT AKI patterns.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • Allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplant (HCT) is a crucial treatment for patients with nonmalignant diseases but often limited by the lack of HLA-matched donors.
  • Recent studies on nonmyeloablative T cell-replete HLA-haploidentical transplants show promising outcomes in hematologic malignancies, encouraging further research in nonmalignant cases.
  • In a study of 23 patients, there was a 0% transplant-related mortality at day 100, and 2-year overall survival rates reached 91%, though strategies to reduce graft-versus-host disease (GVHD) are still needed to enhance treatment efficacy.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Conditioning chemotherapy is used to deplete hematopoietic stem cells in the recipient's marrow, facilitating donor cell engraftment. Although effective, a major issue with chemotherapy is the systemic genotoxicity that increases the risk for secondary malignancies. Antibody conjugates targeting hematopoietic cells are an emerging non-genotoxic method of opening the marrow niche and promoting engraftment of transplanted cells while maintaining intact marrow cellularity.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Hemophilia A and B are coagulation disorders resulting from the loss of functional coagulation factor VIII (FVIII) or factor IX proteins, respectively. Gene therapy for hemophilia with adeno-associated virus vectors has shown efficacy in hemophilia B patients. Although hemophilia A patients are more prevalent, the development of therapeutic adeno-associated virus vectors has been impeded by the size of the F8 cDNA and impaired secretion of FVIII protein.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Neuroblastoma is the most common extracranial solid tumor in children. Most common sites of metastases from neuroblastoma are bone marrow, bone and lymph nodes, however cardiac metastasis is rarely seen. Metastatic cardiac tumors are 20 to 40 times more common than primary cardiac tumors.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Depletion of Ca(2+) from the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) results in activation of plasma membrane Ca(2+) entry channels. This 'store-operated' process requires translocation of a transmembrane ER Ca(2+) sensor protein, stromal interaction molecule 1 (STIM1), to sites closely apposed to Ca(2+) channels at the cell surface. However, it is not known whether a reduction in Ca(2+) stores is coupled to other signalling pathways by this mechanism.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF