Archive for the ‘Veterinary Research’ Category
Stem cell research and use in veterinary medicine
Last Updated on Thursday, 7 July 2011 01:09 Written by admin Thursday, 7 July 2011 01:09
Stem cells show so much promise in human medicine. Cells that have the ability to become anything that the body needs is nothing short of a miracle. What is the role of stem cells in veterinary medicine? Do stem cells have a place? Many say they very much do.
Stem cells are able to be harvested from animals and are primarily used in horses, dogs, and cats for arthritic conditions.
There is much less controversy in veterinary medicine over the use of stem cells (at least at the present time) because of where they are harvested, or obtained. Rather than take stem cells from an umbilical cord or from an unborn fetus, the cells are harvested from the host itself.
How is this possible? Right now we know there is a certain amount of stem cells that exists in adult animals in either fat or bone marrow. These stem cells are considered adult stem cells and are somewhat limited in there ability to become “any cell” as compared to embryonic stem cells. However, adult stem cells can become cells similar to themselves.
What does this mean? There are individual reports of stem cells being used in veterinary medicine for conditions like ligament and tendon injuries in horses, as well as to treat a condition called laminitis. Everyone knows what tendons and ligaments are but what is laminitis?
Laminitis is a condition in horses that affects the blood supply and connective tissue from the bone to the hoof. In mild cases of laminitis there is just pain and inflammation which can be treated with rest, anti-inflammatories and special shoes to fit on the hoof.
Unfortunately, many times mild cases can progress to severe cases. There are also specific causes of laminitis that skip the mild phase and go right to the severe phase. The more severe phase can permanently damage the blood supply and the hoof would actually start to separate from the bone. If this happens many times it is irreversible and the only option for this is humane euthanasia. Stem cell therapy has been used to help to regrow the blood supply and connective tissue.
There are also reports that injecting adult stem cells harvested from bone marrow or fat can be used to treat arthritis in dogs and cats. There is a thin layer of cartilage that covers the bone at the joint called synovial cartilage. Synovial cartilage cushions the bone at the joint, as well as produces joint fluid. Joint fluid not only acts as a lubricant allowing the bones to slide back and forth, but also contains natural antioxidants and immune defenses.
When arthritis occurs in dogs the thin layers of synovial cartilage begin to degrade, or break down. It doesn’t happen all at once but when the cartilage is lost it does not grow back naturally. This is when you will hear orthopedists talk about “bone-on-bone” contact, and bone-on-bone contact is intensely painful.
The injection of stem cells into the joint has shown promise in regrowing this thin layer of synovial cartilage. No controlled studies have been performed to substantiate this claim. However, there are reports from various veterinarians using stem cells for this purpose that they see an improvement in their patients after receiving a stem cell treatment.
Using stem cells in veterinary patients to regrow tissue of any organ in the body is a long way off and even the use of stem cells for specific conditions like arthritis and laminitis has not been completely proven successful but there is hope on the horizon.
Source: http://www.northshoreoflongisland.com/Articles-i-2011-07-07-88828.112114-sub-Stem-cell-research-and-use-in-veterinary-medicine.html
Posted under Cell Analysis, Medicinal Chemistry, Research Projects, Stem Cell Research, Veterinary Research | Comments Off
The Second Disease To Ever Be Globally Eradicated: Rinderpest
Last Updated on Thursday, 30 June 2011 11:06 Written by admin Thursday, 30 June 2011 11:06
One of the greatest scourges of human history is no more. For only the second time, modern public health practices have managed to eradicate a pandemic illness of global reach. The first was smallpox. Now what? AIDS? TB? No. Today, the world’s cattle are safe from rinderpest.
If you’ve never heard of rinderpest, it’s likely because you live in America, where thanks to the quarantine of distance and history the disease never established itself. But in the old world, cattle have kept company with humans for some 8,000 years, often in settings of extraordinary intimacy. Farm families throughout Europe lived in crofts, homes that doubled as stables; pastorlists like the Nuer people of Sudan, who drink not only cows’ milk but their blood as well, rely on cattle to supply nearly all their needs.
Through the many generations of coexistence, humans and their domesticated herds have shared their illnesses; smallpox, the only other disease eradicated by modern public health practices, likely began among cattle (the first smallpox vaccines were made by scraping matter from lesions on cows). In rinderpest, we humans returned the favor–scientists now think that the disease, a relative of measles, evolved from the human pathogen as recently as a thousand years ago.
Although no human ever fell ill from rinderpest, its toll on our species has been considerable. With mortality rates among afflicted herds approaching 90 percent, rinderpest outbreaks quickly starved populations of cattle-dependent farmers. In East Africa, its introduction had much the same effect as human diseases did in the New World in the wake of first European contact, laying waste to entire societies and rendering them defenseless in the face of colonialism. It has been blamed for the stagnation of agricultural economies and the rise and fall of empires. Though the last case was seen in 2001, farmers can now rest easy knowing the disease is fully contained. The benefits of rinderpest-free herds to agrarian economies will only grow with time.
Rinderpest’s eradication depended on recent innovations in medical practice. It took a combination of technical advances, including a new form of vaccine that doesn’t need to be refrigerated; and culturally-sensitive public health protocols, relying on local veterinary assistants rather than pith-helmeted foreign specialists to manage the disease in its far-flung pastures. Its eradication is evidence of one of the curious insights of modern public health: that while disease is global, medicine often takes a village.
Source: http://www.fastcompany.com/1764227/the-eradication-of-rinderpest
Posted under Discoveries, Innovations and Patents, Press Releases, Veterinary Research | Comments Off
Researchers Find Cousin of Hepatitis C Virus in Dogs
Last Updated on Tuesday, 24 May 2011 02:45 Written by admin Tuesday, 24 May 2011 02:45
MONDAY, May 23 (HealthDay News) — Researchers report that they’ve discovered a virus similar to the human hepatitis C virus in dogs, a finding that might provide insight into how the germ evolved in people and perhaps lead to better treatments.
About 200 million people around the world are thought to suffer from hepatitis C, including an estimated 3.2 million chronically infected people in the United States. Many don’t know they’re infected with the liver-damaging virus that causes the disease, which means they can spread it to others without realizing it.
The new findings suggest that hepatitis C may have “jumped” from dogs to humans more than five centuries ago, the researchers said.
“Considering the origin of HIV, we expected to find the closest homologs, or genetic relatives, of [hepatitis C virus] in non-human primates,” study author Dr. Amit Kapoor, an investigator with Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health’s Center for Infection and Immunity, said in a news release.
“However,” Kapoor added, “while we were analyzing samples from dogs involved in outbreaks of respiratory disease, we came upon a virus that was more similar to HCV than other viruses of the same family. So far, we have only detected [the virus] in sick animals, a few of which had died of unknown causes. Because of its close genetic similarity to HCV, we suggested the name of canine hepacivirus.”
Study co-author Dr. Charles Rice, scientific and executive director of the Center for the Study of Hepatitis C at The Rockefeller University, said in the news release that the beginnings of hepatitis C “remain a mystery. These findings underscore the need to look beyond primates for clues to the origins.”
Scientists say there’s no risk of modern-day dogs infecting people with either human hepatitis C or the canine form.
Hepatitis C is a liver disease that’s typically spread through contact with infected blood. It can also spread through sex with an infected person and from mother to baby during childbirth, according to the U.S. National Institutes of Health.
The study appears in this week’s issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Source: http://health.usnews.com/health-news/family-health/digestive-disorders/articles/2011/05/23/researchers-find-cousin-of-hepatitis-c-virus-in-dogs
Posted under Discoveries, Innovations and Patents, Medicinal Chemistry, North America, Research Projects, USA and Canada, Veterinary Research | Comments Off
Gossypol Biological Properties
Last Updated on Monday, 22 October 2007 11:34 Written by admin Monday, 22 October 2007 11:33
Gossypol:
- is a polyphenolic aldehyde that permeates cells and acts as an inhibitor for several dehydrogenase enzymes.
- is antimalarial being the selective inhibitor of Plasmodium falciparum (pfLDH over hLDHs), an essential enzyme for energy generation within malarial parasite.
- posesses proapoptotic properties, probably due to the regulation of the Bax and Bcl2.
- reversibly inhibits Calcineurin and binds to calmodulin.
- inhibits replication of the HIV-1 virus.
- an effective protein kinase C inhibitor.
Posted under Cancer Research, HIV Research, Medicinal Chemistry, Natural Products, New Products, Reagents, Veterinary Research | Comments Off
InnoVet Selects EBD Group to Power its Conference Partnering
Last Updated on Sunday, 14 October 2007 08:45 Written by admin Sunday, 14 October 2007 08:45
Carlsbad, CA , October 09, 2007 – EBD Group, the leading partnering firm for the global biotechnology industry, today announced that it has been selected to run the partnering facility for InnoVet 2007, the premier international veterinary business conference and partnering event held this year in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, Canada, October 14-16, 2007. InnoVet will use EBD Group’s PartneringOne™ software and services to generate new business and networking meetings among attending senior business executives, veterinary product developers, financial institutions, early-stage companies and regulators from around the world.
PartneringOne is a complete conference partnering solution that combines the industry’s most trusted and intuitive web-based partnering system with best practice implementation services. PartneringOne enables conference delegates to efficiently and effectively identify partnering opportunities and pre-arrange private one-to-one meetings with targeted firms and representatives. Purpose-built, web-based and easy to use, PartneringOne provides a structured tool driven by powerful algorithms for facilitating partnering meetings, while at the same time presenting a user-friendly interface that masks the sophisticated processing behind the screen. PartneringOne today powers many of the world’s largest partnering conferences, including BIO-Europe Spring, ERBI’s BioPartnering Exchange and AdvaMed 2007.
“We are excited to work with InnoVet 2007 as the partnering engine for this highly respected conference,†said Carola Schropp, Managing Director, EBD Group. “Strategic partnering is the fuel that keeps any innovation-based industry healthy and growing. As the leading conference for the veterinary industry, InnoVet plays an important role in fostering new relationships and in the exchange of ideas. With PartneringOne, InnoVet 2007 will create new vistas of partnering opportunities for its many delegates.â€
“We are excited to work with EBD Group to provide expert partnering for the InnoVet 2007 International Veterinary Business Conference. We investigated other partnering systems and PartneringOne was attractive to us in functionality, ease of use and customization to meet the unique needs of our veterinary business market,†Rose Fitzpatrick, Conference Manager, InnoVet 2007.
About InnoVet
INNOVET is the premiere North American based animal health industry conference. In a short span of 5 years, InnoVet has emerged as a “must attend†event for animal health strategic planners and executives. InnoVet focuses on topical issues important to the worldwide animal health industry, while providing a unique opportunity for networking between major industry players, regulators, service providers and life sciences research communities.
About EBD Group
EBD Group is the leading partnering firm for the global biotechnology industry. Since 1993, firms in the life sciences have leveraged EBD Group’s partnering conferences, technology and services to identify business opportunities and develop strategic relationships that drive their business.
EBD Group’s conferences (run in collaboration with leading industry partners and international trade associations such as BIO and Eucomed) include BIO-Europe, the world’s largest stand-alone life science partnering conference; BIO-Europe Spring; the investor conference, BioEquity Europe (co-organized with BioCentury Publications); and the convergent medical technology partnering conference, BioDevice Partnering. EBD’s novel, web-based, partnering software system is also used at numerous third-party events around the world. Outside of the conference format, EBD Group’s consultants can provide hands-on assistance for firms seeking to in- or out-license products and technologies.
EBD Group has offices in San Diego, Munich and London. For more information visit www.ebdgroup.com.
Posted under Collaborations, Europe, North America, Press Releases, USA and Canada, Veterinary Research | Comments Off