This blog post originally appeared on Signals.
The RCIScience panel in action. Credit: Farah Qaiser
Stem cells offer a lot of promise and potential when it comes to regeneration, but the field also faces a lot of hype and misinformation. To tackle this, the Royal Canadian Institute for Science (RCIScience) hosted a panel in October titled “Stem cells: the path to future regeneration.” The event featured Dr. Samantha Yammine as a moderator, and panelists Dr. Nika Shakiba, Dr. Lise Munsie and Síofradh McMahon. In this blog post, I’ll highlight some of the key take-aways from the event.
Dr. Yammine, who has studied stem cells for over six years, realized during the course of her PhD that there was a lot of hype and misinformation surrounding stem cell therapies. As a program committee member with RCIScience, and someone who is passionate about educating the public about science, she felt that this topic was timely.
But what are stem cells? That’s what Dr. Shakiba’s talk was about. She described stem cells as the building blocks of tissues and organs. They have two key properties: self-renewal (i.e. the ability to divide infinitely) and the potential to differentiate into different cell types, such as cardiac cells. Dr. Shakiba explained that there are different types of stem cells, as follows:
totipotent, which are capable of forming any cell and have the same potential as a fertilized egg;
pluripotent, which can give rise to many different cell types, such as embryonic stem cells; and,
multipotent, which have multiple but restricted potential and can develop into specialized cell types, such as adult stem cells.
In addition, researchers have used cellular reprogramming to generate induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) since 2006. These cells are also capable of self-renewal and pluripotency. This discovery earned a Nobel Prize in 2012 – highlighting just how recent these discoveries are. Dr. Shakiba discussed the potential that stem cell research offers, such as enhancing our understanding of tissue development and disease, and developing cell and tissue therapies, to stimulating the body’s own stem cells to regenerate damaged tissues.
For example, bone marrow transplants, which are proven effective and have been used successfully for half a century, are an example of a common cell therapy today. As per Dr. Shakiba, the “magic sauce” in this therapy is a blood (“hematopoietic”) stem cell, which is able to treat cancers such as lymphoma and leukaemia.
Here’s a fun fact: Canadian scientists Drs. James Till and Ernest McCulloch first discovered stem cells in 1961.
Next, Dr. Munsie shared how the “future” of stem cells is in fact happening in real-time and highlighted some of the therapies that are in development.
For example, the human brain consists of multiple cell types, including astrocytes, microglia and oligodendrocytes. In the past, researchers have studied cell types individually in vitro (in a test tube or culture dish), but this doesn’t account for how a cell interacts with its neighbours, different cells types or in a 3-D environment. Dr. Munsie highlighted how organoids, which are 3-D tissue cultures derived from stem cells, allow for better modelling.
Another recent development is the idea of “cloaking” – where gene editing techniques (like CRISPR) can be used to create stem cells that do not provoke an immune system response, and thus cloak them from the immune system.
It’s clear that stem cell research and therapy development are continuing to make strides in the path to future regeneration, which brings us to the next hurdle: the regulatory challenges to commercializing stem cell technologies. Here, Ms. McMahon described the field of regulatory affairs as the bridge between what government and companies want, where cell therapies are often regulated as a drug. This includes rigorous clinical trials and control in all stages of development, including manufacturing, distribution and the commercial market, to control and minimize risk to patients.
Ms. McMahon pointed out that stem cell therapies are carefully regulated for good reason, yet we continue to see hype around unproven stem cell treatments. This happens because some clinics take advantage of patients who are out of options and are desperately looking for any treatment that might promise a cure or reduce their pain to improve their quality of life.
Ms. McMahon says that there are currently only three approved stem cell therapies in Canada. For those seeking treatments, she recommends looking into Health Canada’s approved products, ongoing clinical trials (upon physician referral) or Special Access Programs. If there’s a price tag associated with a clinical trial, it probably isn’t legitimate.
With a topic as compelling as this, you can imagine that it prompted interesting questions from the audience! Panel attendees were asked whether stem cell therapies can be used to generate superpowers, for context around the recent human-pig hybrids created in the lab, and whether stem cells could be used to develop therapies for animals.
In case you’re curious, Dr. Yammine says that it’s more likely we’ll see cyborgs before any cell enhancement therapies appear (as stem cell therapies take time to develop and require rigorous testing for safety). As per Dr. Shakiba, there are researchers currently developing stem cell therapies for animals. These approaches are synergistic; a successful therapy in animals could inform stem cell therapy development in humans.
Personally, the biggest takeaway for me was the panelists’ reflections on how unproven stem cell treatments are hurting the field of stem cell research itself. Dr. Shakiba pointed out that horror stories resulting from unproven stem cell treatments can set the field back and Dr. Munsie reiterated that this is why clinical trials are so important.
Want to hear more? RCIScience videotaped the event. You can watch the talks and panel discussion here.
Here’s a quick checklist for assessing claims about a specific stem cell procedure, made by Samantha Yammine, PhD. Opinions are her own and do not constitute medical advice. Please consult your family health team.
About the Author: Farah Qaiser
Farah Qaiser is a graduate student at the University of Toronto, where her research involves using DNA sequencing to better understand complex neurological disorders. When not in the lab, Farah dabbles in various science communication, policy and outreach initiatives in an effort to build an engaging and inclusive science culture here in Canada. Of note, Farah was a member of the organizing team for the 2018 Toronto March for Science, has led Wikipedia Edit-A-Thons to address the encyclopedia’s gender and racial biases, and is one of the four co-founders of the Toronto Science Policy Network. You can find Farah live-tweeting Toronto’s many science events at @this_is_farah or speed-reading (yet another) dystopian novel on her commute home.