Irv Weissman Eradicate Cancer 2018

Irv Weissman

As the first scientist to identify and isolate mammalian blood-forming stem cells in mice, Dr. Weissman is considered the father of hematopoiesis. His group has successfully defined the stages of development that occur between stems cells and mature progeny. He has also discovered human hematopoietic stem cells (HSC) and human brain cell forming stem cell populations, as well as murine skeletal muscle and osteochrondal stem cells. His work on human HSCs led to a trial at Stanford sponsored by SyStemix of cancer-free purified HSCs to rescue stage IV breast cancer patients after high-dose therapies, and resulted in 33 percent of patients alive at 15 years versus 7 percent for unpurified cells. Similarly, brain-forming stem cells previously identified by Dr. Weissman are also currently in clinical trials for a number of neurodegenerative diseases. Additionally, Dr. Weissman has pioneered the investigation of genes and proteins involved in cell adhesion events that are required for lymphocyte homing to lymphoid organs in vivo. Recently, Dr. Weissman's laboratory has demonstrated that the protein CD47 is normally expressed on the surface of blood stem cells to protect them from macrophages. By blocking CD47 with a single antibody, Weissman’s team has been able to essentially cure most cases of human acute myeloid leukemia in mice. Treatment with this antibody has also been shown to synergize with rituximab to eliminate non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma in mice. This work has since been expanded to include other human tumors transplanted into mice, specifically breast, ovarian, colon, bladder, brain, liver, and prostate tumors. Results of these experiments have shown shrinkage and/or disappearance of tumors in almost all cases and may lead to new methods by which to use the immune system to attack tumors

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