Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells (iPS)

Researchers created an embryo model that looks and acts like a natural human embryo. They say it’s an ethical way of gaining a better understanding of embryonic development that may provide answers about birth defects and infertility.

Researchers have transplanted precursor stem cells into the damaged heart muscle of pigs, repairing injured cells and improving heart function. The study may lead to a treatment that can regenerate heart muscle damaged by a lack of oxygen.

Australian researchers have achieved two firsts that will assist in the battle against heart disease: they created a tiny beating heart with its own vascular system and uncovered how the vascular system affects inflammation-driven heart damage.

Human stem cells can differentiate into any human cell. But dedifferentiation, differentiation in reverse, is implicated in several diseases. Now, researchers have uncovered a mechanism key to the process of stem cell dedifferentiation.

Scientists have for the first time created male and female stem cells from the same person. This means the cells are genetically identical except for the sex chromosomes, enabling a new platform for studying sex differences in drugs and diseases.

Scientists have grown mini eyes from human cells in the lab. These eye organoids provide good models of the real thing to help scientists study diseases that cause blindness and potentially find treatments.

Researchers have created induced pluripotent stem cells from the genetic material of the critically endangered Sumatran rhino, potentially providing new ways to help conservation efforts. They even used them to grow mini rhino brains in lab dishes.

Researchers at the University of New South Wales have demonstrated how a microfluidic device that mimics the embryonic heart can produce blood stem cell precursors, which could let blood stem cells be manufactured on demand.

Researchers have created some of the most advanced synthetic mouse embryos out of stem cells, removing the need for sperm, eggs and even a womb. The technology could help us understand development and eventually be used to grow organs for transplant.

Researchers have developed a new drug cocktail that can convert cells into totipotent stem cells, the very seeds of life. These cells can differentiate into any cell in the body, potentially bypassing the need for sperm and eggs to grow an organism.

Through experimentation with a highly promising anti-aging technique, scientists at the UK's Babraham Institute have demonstrated a new way of turning back the clock in human skin cells, so they function like cells 30 years younger.

Researchers have found that the “mother” of stem cells, known as totipotent stem cells, have a much slower rate of DNA replication, which helps improve their differentiation efficiency. This could lead to major breakthrough for regenerative medicine.