Fighting disease
with the power of cells.

1.2 billion allogeneic MAPC (MultiStem) IV 24–48 h after stroke. MASTERS (double-blind, 137 randomised, 33 UK/US sites) was safe, but the day-90 primary endpoint failed in the 126 analysed (OR 1.08, p=0.83). Plus the 9 years since.

At eight UK sites, 20 million allogeneic neural stem cells (CTX0E03) were injected into the putamen of 23 stroke patients by stereotactic neurosurgery. The primary endpoint was not met, the randomized trial meant to confirm the findings stopped at 15 patients, and the developer went through administration and delisted. Here is what a single-arm study can and cannot say, read straight from the numbers.

An average of 22 months after stroke, paralysis that should no longer move. A phase 1/2a trial implanting genetically modified allogeneic bone marrow MSCs (SB623) around the infarct met its primary endpoint in 18 patients over two years. But there is no control group. Two months later the phase 2b ACTIsSIMA, sham-controlled in 163 patients, missed its primary endpoint (p = 0.6743). The same cells reached approval not in stroke but in the parallel traumatic brain injury trial.

IL-10, the cytokine that calms inflammation, never quite became a drug: it is unstable and clears from the body fast. A Michigan State University team harvested extracellular vesicles from cells made to overexpress IL-10 with minicircle DNA, and shows they are more stable than recombinant IL-10 and quiet inflammatory macrophages. But naïve vesicles, with no IL-10 gene introduced, worked too. Every experiment is in cultured cells.

ALMB-0166, the first Cx43-hemichannel antibody, given as a single dose to 24 SCI patients: adverse events matched placebo, 1200/2400mg improved scores, two reached AIS E. A small, exploratory result.

A narrative review of knee injections, corticosteroids to exosomes: an RCT tying repeated triamcinolone to cartilage loss, and the evidence-maturity gap across PRP, orthobiologics, MSCs, exosomes.

Stroke, TBI, and Alzheimer's/Parkinson's differ in cause but converge on the same breakdown pathways. Why don't NGF and BDNF work in humans? A Russian team reads the delivery barrier from six trials.

Neurogenic bladder afflicts more than 80% of people with spinal cord injury. A careful reading of a preclinical study reporting that the anti-RGMa antibody elezanumab improved voiding function and neuroplasticity in rats. Efficacy in humans has not yet been shown.

A phase 3 trial in ALS of autologous mesenchymal stem cells induced to secrete high levels of neurotrophic factors (NurOwn). The primary endpoint was not met (33% vs 28%, OR=1.33, P=.45). The signal in the less-impaired subgroup was not statistically significant and is only hypothesis-generating, yet the CSF biomarkers showed a clear biological effect. A piece for reading expectation and reality apart.

A tadpole whose spinal cord is severed will regenerate; after metamorphosis, the same frog cannot, and its response closely resembles that of humans. In Chile, Dr. Slater and colleagues showed that on the non-regenerating side, mitochondria swell by day 6 after injury, cristae turn into vesicles, and the respiratory enzyme COX shuts down. Yet ATP did not fall — it rose. Genes for glycolysis and genes that mobilize fat were both switched on. That said, the extra ATP may simply have leaked out of damaged tissue. Dr. Exotaro reads this preclinical frog study.

A man paralyzed from the neck down can now move his own hand by thought alone and even feel the texture of what he grips. A team at the Feinstein Institutes for Medical Research has developed a 'double neural bypass (DNB)' that bridges the brain to the spinal cord and cortex at the same time. While the device is on, it takes over hand movement and touch (assist); through electrical-stimulation training it also drew out recovery that persists even after the device is switched off (therapy). Cracking an egg without breaking it, feeding himself, feeling a dog's fur again through a once-paralyzed wrist—Dr. Exotaro unpacks this landmark first-in-human study.

As obesity drags on, pancreatic beta cells multiply and work harder to hold off diabetes (beta cell compensation). A team at China Pharmaceutical University shows that in this emergency, beta cells release extracellular vesicles (sEV) loaded with miR-151 and turn nearby mesenchymal stem cells (MSC) into helpers. Freed from the KLF9 brake, the MSCs proliferate and secrete WNT to support beta cells. Dr. Exotaro unpacks this cell-and-mouse preclinical study.

Aging livers quietly store fat as autophagy rusts. A Shandong team shows HucMSC exosomes — THBS1 as key cargo, PPAR as a downstream pathway — ease fat, senescence and glucose problems in aged mice.

Exercise reaches the brain through peripheral signals—BDNF, lactate, immune and vascular messengers. But a biomarker "moving" is not the same as cognition returning. An Italian neurorehabilitation team offers an integrative model: the biological effects of exercise become clinically meaningful only when they couple to attention-demanding movement and surface as a behavior called cognitive-motor integration (CMI). Exotaro unpacks a review that surveys the differences across stroke, Parkinson's, MS, and TBI, and how to deploy VR, robots, and wearables.

In Parkinson's disease, the brain's immune cells—microglia—switch into a 'combat mode that guzzles sugar,' damaging neurons through inflammation. A research team in Haikou, China, showed that lncA2M-AS1, a long non-coding RNA (lncRNA) carried by exosomes from olfactory mucosa-derived mesenchymal stem cells (OM-MSC), calms microglial metabolism and suppresses neuroinflammation through two switches, CFL1 and ROCK1. Exotaro walks through this preclinical study in mice and cultured cells.

Diabetic wounds pit impaired angiogenesis against chronic inflammation. A team engineered bFGF-loaded, RGD-targeted M2 exosomes, delivered deep by a dissolving microneedle, to speed healing in diabetic mice.

MSC-derived extracellular vesicles are biocompatible, low-immunogenicity 'natural nanocapsules.' This review maps six strategies to engineer them into drug carriers and their clinical safety data.

MSC-derived small extracellular vesicles (sEV) were given IV to spinal cord injury rats. At the same total dose, continuous infusion enhanced motor recovery more than daily injection.

Extracellular vesicles (EVs) are key mediators of intercellular communication with broad application across biomedicine, veterinary medicine, cosmetics, agriculture, and the environment.

Bone metastasis of prostate cancer (PCa) markedly worsens prognosis, with a 5-year survival rate of only 30%, and features a complex mix of osteolytic and osteoblastic lesions.