patrick.net

curious2 says

when D's are in charge, they call stem cell research "unaffordable"

You are using quotation marks.

Have a citation for this?

HydroCabron says

Have a citation for this?

It's in the linked OP article, "there is no money." But, according to the D's favorite legislation, they have an Act to cover what they claim is "affordable," even though that costs much more and often confers no benefit.

Do you have any useful information about Parkinson's research, or was your only purpose your usual citation-free partisan trolling?

curious2 says

HydroCabron says

Have a citation for this?

It's in the linked OP article, "there is no money." But, according to the D's favorite legislation, they have an Act to cover what they claim is "affordable," even though that costs much more and often confers no benefit.

Yeah: I can read. That's a quote of Fox saying it.

You're a unscrupulous liar.

You made up a quote: you chose the word "unaffordable" and implied some Democratic spokesperson uttered it. You lied.

The Dems had a filibuster-proof majority for 72 days, thanks to Kennedy's terminal illness, Byrd's infirmity, and the drawn-out Franken-Coleman recount.

If they had made it a top priority, they probably couldn't have done it. A significant chunk of the Democratic caucus is yellow-dog, and must answer to slavering dark-ages anti-abortion lunatics in their home districts.

Sorry to interrupt your lies. Please continue with your delusional screeds about unaffordable care foisted on America by big pharma and a cabal of industry shills bent on sending us all to the funeral home as expensively as possible. I'm sure this new angle you're working will be as refreshing and non-repetitive as the others, you lying piece of shit.

Gotta go. I'm reallocating the proceeds from my work here as a medical industry shill.

I have decided to preserve your comment in toto, just in case you should ever come to your senses and attempt to delete it. It provides a perfect example of your typical comments. Contrary to your patently false accusations I did not lie, and your citation-free partisan defense does not persuade. If you apologize sincerely, then I may delete it, but otherwise it stays.

HydroCabron says

curious2 says

HydroCabron says

Have a citation for this?

It's in the linked OP article, "there is no money." But, according to the D's favorite legislation, they have an Act to cover what they claim is "affordable," even though that costs much more and often confers no benefit.

Yeah: I can read. That's a quote of Fox saying it.

You're a unscrupulous liar.

You made up a quote: you chose the word "unaffordable" and implied some Democratic spokesperson uttered it. You lied.

The Dems had a filibuster-proof majority for 72 days, thanks to Kennedy's terminal illness, Byrd's infirmity, and the drawn-out Franken-Coleman recount.

If they had made it a top priority, they probably couldn't have done it. A significant chunk of the Democratic caucus is yellow-dog, and must answer to slavering dark-ages anti-abortion lunatics in their home districts.

Sorry to interrupt your lies. Please continue with your delusional screeds about unaffordable care foisted on America by big pharma and a cabal of industry shills bent on sending us all to the funeral home as expensively as possible. I'm sure this new angle you're working will be as refreshing and non-repetitive as the others, you lying piece of shit.

Gotta go. I'm reallocating the proceeds from my work here as a medical industry shill.

Back to the original topic: are there any SF Bay area companies researching a cure for Parkinson's Disease, and what experience have they had?

anonymous says

PDF is labeled Medicines in Development for Parkinson's Disease

http://www.phrma.org/sites/default/files/pdf/2014-parkinsons-report.pdf

Thank you anonymous! I wish I could Like that comment 10x. The two viral gene therapies in Phase 1 trials at UCSF look especially interesting.

How about using pre-existing adult stem cells, to re-generate the substantia nigra, the section of the brain damaged by Parkinson's?

Damn curious, it's as if you drew a funny cartoon insulting the demhadist's God. That hydro carbon fella sure doesn't take well to any purported criticism of his gods. Not even sure you criticised anything, just questioned the ineffectiveness of his gods

And to top it off, he went for the mother of all kettle calling pot black,

. I'm sure this new angle you're working will be as refreshing and non-repetitive as the others, you lying piece of shit.

Lololololol

nothing in the opening remarks, even if untrue, comes close to the hydraheaded response.
only palpable explanation is mysogyny extraordinaire.

errc says

Damn curious, it's as if you drew a funny cartoon insulting the demhadist's God.

Rin says

How about using pre-existing adult stem cells, to re-generate the substantia nigra, the section of the brain damaged by Parkinson's?

Thanks Rin for suggesting that! I had been reading about using adult stem cells, induced pluripotent stem (IPS) cells, and other research into stem cell treatments. Many very smart people believe that may prove the best approach, although it does have some issues to sort out.

One issue is delivery: to replace the dying cells in the brain would likely require delivering the cells directly into the right location inside the brain, which requires inherently costly surgery. (I suppose eventually a robot could do it, based on MRI data showing the location and a brace to hold the head in position and a small drill through the skull followed by a long syringe into the brain. That would probably take years to develop though.)

Another is duration: nobody seems to know what kills the original dopamine producing and regulating cells, so even a successful replacement procedure might need to be repeated if the replacements fall victim to the same disease.

A vaccine to protect the cells is probably a decade away. (Affiris completed successful Phase 1 trial of one candidate, and is beginning Phase 1 trials of another.)

In addition, drug trials are underway to see if existing or new drugs might prevent further deterioration.

The viral gene therapy may offer efficient delivery and protect remaining cells, although replacing lost cells may still require IPS or other stem cell methods.

curious2 says

Thanks Rin for suggesting that! I had been reading about using adult stem cells, induced pluripotent stem (IPS) cells, and other research into stem cell treatments. Many very smart people believe that may prove the best approach, although it does have some issues to sort out.

Here's the thing, the adult stem cells need to be 're-generated' in the sense that certain prior tests of moving an older person's derived cells, didn't have enough replications to make much of a difference.

On the other hand, these cells can be extracted from fatty tissues, blood, and other sources, grown outside the body in a high estrogen media, get their telomeres extended, as estrogen has been known to activate the telomerase gene, and then, when the cells are effectively made younger, having the same number of division totals as a ~30 year old, they can be transplanted on site. Of course, all traces of that media need to be removed first.

There are already clinics outside of the USA, offering such treatments, and outside of let's say the brain, since there's a bit of a blood/brain barrier there, these cells can be IV dripped and even those with prior heart conditions get better quickly. I know someone whose friend did this and his recovery is quite dramatic. Of course, not a single US MD told him about this.
curious2 says

The viral gene therapy may offer efficient delivery and protect remaining cells, although replacing lost cells may still require IPS or other stem cell methods.

I'd much rather go back, every 10 years, than do a retroviral treatment. That's the boundary of the 'Biology of Cancer' and we already have enough viral contaminations as it is, which is why chickenpox survivors get shingles in old age. It's the same virus, hiding and waiting its turn.

Thanks Rin :)

I had found online Stemgenex in San Diego. The website says they harvest stem cells from adipose tissue, and deliver them via IV or "intra nasal" or "direct site injections." It doesn't say if they inject directly into the brain.

I suppose anything has risks, e.g. the risks you mentioned regarding viral gene therapy. Stem cells could conceivably grow into something undesirable also, e.g. cancer or an elbow in the middle of the skull. The issue is the range of risks: the upside potential may offset the downside risk, especially compared to existing approved therapies that (at best) slow the worsening of symptoms.

curious2 says

Stem cells could conceivably grow into something undesirable also, e.g. cancer or an elbow in the middle of the skull.

I think the umbilical stem cells have a greater risk than the adult adipose ones. Part of that, I believe, is that the umbilical ones are closer to the body's embryogenesis phase and thus, may get confused and attempt to form an organism, which in this case would be a tumor.

With that stated, probably the best way to find out if the post-estrogen treated adult stem cells pose a cancer treat is to perform a mutation assay on the cells, before and after conditioning. If mutation results indicate that the enhanced, younger cells have more mutations per [ whatever unit they're measured in ], then this treatment has a risk to it. On the other hand, if the results are within a few percentage points then it's probably safe. My biggest concern would be bad batches and contamination.

What I'm curious about, in terms of the Parkinson's trial, is whether or not the efficacy is higher on supporting glial cells than dopamine generating neutrons? Because higher glial function assists all brain function.

Thanks Rin :) I had seen some references to research involving glial cell-derived nerve growth factor for Parkinson's Disease, e.g. WebMD and a potentially very encouraging trial on monkeys reported in 2013. I haven't found much if anything since then though.

NIH got a brief stimulus in 2009-10, but then the bipartisan "sequester" stopped that. The recent Ebola scare brought to the fore vaccines that had languished for a decade, but even that comes at the expense of other NIH efforts.

It saddens and amazes me that so few of today's billionaires seem interested in funding research that might save their own lives or brains, while so many prefer to spend more on a larger yacht instead. And yet, government funding priorities seem similarly short-sighted to me.

curious2 says

It saddens and amazes me that so few of today's billionaires seem interested in funding research that might save their own lives or brains, while so many prefer to spend more on a larger yacht instead. And yet, government funding priorities seem similarly short-sighted to me.

I believe that what billionaires have is a big ego, more than a big imagination. And thus, they'd rather send a few hundred million to a charity hospital, to pat themselves on the back as some 'great' philanthropist.

Hence, I'm not all that impressed with the Bill & Melinda Gates foundation because in a nutshell, what they're doing is making generic Rx below wholesale costs for the third world. In other words, being a pharma subsidizer. As you know, bioavailable Allicin from garlic can hinder many pathogens out there but yet, it's a skunkworks project. Garlic is $5 per pound.

Thanks Rin, following one of your earlier comments I have been consuming garlic whenever I experience cold symptoms, and I do find (anecdotally but consistently) that it seems to help.

Regarding The Gates Foundation, I am sometimes very impressed but I have also found it ironic that they tend to emphasize third world delivery over developing new technology. They have reportedly provided more than $300 million for vaccine research, mainly for HIV which infects ~30 million Africans:

http://www.seattlepi.com/local/article/Gates-Foundation-awards-287-million-for-HIV-1209297.php

http://www.techtimes.com/articles/14828/20140904/gates-foundation-donates-25-million-to-aid-hiv-vaccine-research.htm

In an interview, Bill Gates said that no matter how good your technology is, it doesn't matter if you can't deliver it to the people who need it. I respect that point, but I think the best and most valuable work creates new solutions that didn't exist before. As you've noted, there isn't a shortage of potential STEM workers, but I would say there is a shortage of STEM funding to develop real solutions to widespread problems. Funding such research has many benefits, including enabling STEM grads to achieve their potential while ultimately enabling the whole world to share in the benefit of that work.

curious2 says

I have been consuming garlic whenever I experience cold symptoms, and I do find (anecdotally but consistently) that it seems to help.

Try the isolated, activated, and stablised Allicin, as oppose to the bulb, since a bulb's allinin isn't completely converted. Here's a good company, www.allimax.us, the results are much better.

curious2 says

They have reportedly provided more than $300 million for vaccine research, mainly for HIV

The thing is that it's still name dropping for him. I mean who wouldn't want to say to others than they promote eradicating HIV? That's generally how billionaires think.

curious2 says

I respect that point, but I think the best and most valuable work creates new solutions that didn't exist before.

Yes, and this is the reason why I'm not impressed by Gates.

curious2 says

shortage of STEM funding to develop real solutions to widespread problems. Funding such research has many benefits, including enabling STEM grads to achieve their potential while ultimately enabling the whole world to share in the benefit of that work.

STEM graduates, like all graduates, need a livelihood. And for many ppl, that's leaving STEM for careers in consulting, finance, law, or health care. In general, ppl with motivation, drive, and intelligence, won't want to be cannon fodder for a system which completely exploits them as in academia.

Raw crushed garlic is more effective from an overall medicinal standpoint than Allicin which has a very short lifespan and is just one of the many active ingredients in garlic. If you cannot stomach it or don't like the breath it's a decent alternative just for the Allicin aspect of garlic. Garlic is considered one of the most potent natural antimicrobials by some and that view is consistent with my experiences (not just for viral infections, you can literally chew it and effectively combat strep throat). Regarding Parkinsons, Ampakines are considered a compound of interest, also for many other indications, generally improving memory functions, but research and drug development seems to be crawling along at snails pace there as well. Piracetam is a weak one (which you can get as a supplement) if you need a few good hours of focused coding or improved brain power for an exam or during a battle of chess ;)

curious2 says

Am I the only one to notice this pattern: when R's are in charge, they call stem cell research "immoral" (though they launch phony wars killing thousands of people including children); when D's are in charge, they call stem cell research "unaffordable" (though they launch infinite mandatory spending on entrenched industry revenue models)?

The solution is quite simple. Infect every Republican senator and representative and their family members with diseases that have no cure but that stem cell research offers good hope of a cure. Watch them change their tune in a second.

The only principle that Republicans consistently uphold is the principle of self-interest.

That sounds like Mad TV's cure for cancer.

A number of years ago, when Gates first created MS research, he wanted to envision his company in a similar manner as a Bell Labs of yesteryear. So it was suppose to be place where ppl with independent ideas could work on them. What happened, however, was that when his so-called free researchers came up with things like handheld devices, etc, him and Ballmer shot them down, because that didn't necessarily promote the Windows platform. Notice that a decade later ... those devices are now ubiquitous?

Here's my complaint about the above ... if he wanted mere slaves, then just say it, 'Hey, you work for me, now do as you're told or you're fired!'

The fact that a couple of billionaires were so ill equipped to deal with some middle class creative workers is astounding. When I retire from this hedge fund, ppl like Gates won't be able to hire me. I'll tell 'em right off the bat that if they think they can control and manipulate me, then they can go f'ck themselves. He can insult me all that he wants but since I pay my own bills, he's powerless. That's the difference between an independent soul and that of a corporate kiss *ss.

I'd realized that when Warren Buffet and him did a town hall discussion with Columbia business school attendants. Everyone was so keen on getting approval that they didn't ask either of the billionaires any tough questions. It was like they were sucking some c*ck to perhaps find some work there in the future. It was lame.

mell says

Raw crushed garlic is more effective from an overall medicinal standpoint than Allicin which has a very short lifespan and is just one of the many active ingredients in garlic.

You can have it both ways, a stabilized Allicin (via chemical process engineering) along with crushed garlic, then one or the other.

Dan8267 says

The solution is quite simple. Infect every Republican senator and representative and their family members with diseases that have no cure but that stem cell research offers good hope of a cure. Watch them change their tune in a second.

Just the reps and senators - not their family members. These elected officials have a long history of abandoning their spouses on their death bed to run off with half-their-age office staffers or Argentinian models.

For anyone interested in reading further about the topic, here is a report from the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine following a 2013 SF workshop "in
collaboration with the Centre for Regenerative Medicine (CRM) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH)." It includes a "snapshot" of current technologies and suggests criteria for future stem cell trials.

BTW, the included UK link to the TRANSEURO project is not working at the moment, though it appears in search results and the project remains online at an EU URL, and the project is described on the NIH website.

mell says

Ampakines are considered a compound of interest, also for many other indications, generally improving memory functions, but research and drug development seems to be crawling along at snails pace there as well. Piracetam is a weak one (which you can get as a supplement)

Thanks mell :)

I found links showing interest in ampakines, and links to online retailers. Unfortunately, I have not yet found any published studies or results.

Meanwhile, I've been finding providers of stem cell technology, including an SF company:

http://sfstemcellcenter.com/stem-cell-treatment/

I haven't yet found data to evaluate results though.

BTW, although Google News can be the most current way to see the most recently updated stories, it suffers from a commercial bias, manipulated by publicists and public relations (PR) campaigns. Just as Google search spawned a search engine optimization (SEO) industry, Google News has apparently done likewise for the PR industry. I've been reading about Parkinson's and Google News alerted me to a widely reported study that said Parkinson's patients improve more with expensive placebos than cheap ones; the sample size turned out to be 12 patients. The study authors note that it provides "Class III evidence," i.e. the lowest of any type of study other than Internet surveys and phoning an expert, but it made headlines almost simultaneously throughout the commercial press. I am guessing the PR campaign to push the study cost probably 100x more than the study itself, and who knows how many studies of the same size found no effect at all before one turned up saying higher costs confer medicinal benefit. Seeing the glass half-full, I suppose these campaigns were happening long before Google arrived, and now Google News makes obvious the "invisible hand" that had previously been hidden.

Also, if this Parkinson's Disease thread gets the attention of anyone affiliated with California biotech companies, they might want to know that as of November CIRM still had $1 billion to invest and expressed interest in co-funding with industry and investors its $3 billion under Proposition 71. Consistent with the OP at the start of my reading, I have found distressingly little federal funding, but considerable funding at the California state level and from industry and private charities (e.g. the Michael J. Fox Foundation).

curious2 says

Google News has apparently done likewise for the PR industry. I've been reading about Parkinson's and Google News alerted me to a widely reported study that said Parkinson's patients improve more with expensive placebos than cheap ones; the sample size turned out to be 12 patients

Have you thought about using Duck Duck Go? It'll spread the search out, over the various search engines w/o revealing you, and then, it's harder for them to profile their ads towards you?

Thanks Rin, I've been using DuckDuckGo since Patrick mentioned it. I'm not worried about ads, but I do feel somewhat uncomfortable about Big Brother's "Total Information Awareness" combined with "Total Recall." I was fascinated by reports on "60 minutes" about superior memory, including considerable evidence that the ability to forget may be evolutionarily adaptive. I think the EU has a point regarding "the right to be forgotten", though I don't blame the search engines. Many Facebook users report that disclosing their opinions caused them to lose friends, for example. As a species, we have no evolutionary history of "Total Information Awareness" and "Total Recall", and we see many examples where seemingly banal information found online caused serious consequences IRL.

I use a combination of VPN, DuckDuckGo, and Disconnect for privacy.

As for social media, I'd completely rejected it because the way I see it, it's fertile grounds for ID theft.

I created a thread for the sf tech companies involved, but the report merits a comment here too:

"Genentech, 23andMe ink $60 million Parkinson's disease research deal
***
The deal, announced Tuesday, will tap whole genome sequencing data for about 3,000 people in 23andMe's database, including those who have been diagnosed with Parkinson's, a progressive, nervous system disorder that is tagged in more than 50,000 Americans annually. Consenting immediate family members of Parkinson's patients also will be included in the study."

Along with the comments about things that might hopefully work someday, I should probably post this report about something that doesn't work: Creatine monohydrate.... Previous research in mice suggested that creatine supplements might potentially protect nerve cells.
***
The new study included more than 1,700 people in the United States and Canada who had been diagnosed with Parkinson's disease within the previous five years. All were receiving treatment for Parkinson's disease. As part of the study, they were randomly assigned to take creatine or a placebo in addition to their usual treatment.

The patients were enrolled from March 2007 to May 2010 and followed up until September 2013. The study was halted early because those taking creatine showed no differences in disease progression compared to those taking the placebo."

In slightly better news, small studies suggest a new breath test for VOCs might become the first definitive test to diagnose Parkinson's Disease. Researchers are preparing larger studies.

Also in possibly better news, a daily beer may reduce the risk of developing Parkinson's and Alzheimer's diseases.

Today's NY Times reports on additional research: An American biotech company [in Cambridge, MA], NeuroPhage, for example, plans to enroll Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s patients in 2016 and 2017 in Phase 1 trials of its new product, a genetically engineered compound derived from a naturally occurring virus called M13. Researchers have demonstrated that this compound can enter rodents’ brains and neutralize toxic clumps of alpha-synuclein and the corresponding targets for Alzheimer’s (the proteins amyloid beta and tau).

A Roche and Prothena collaboration Phase 1 trial Reports Reduction of Free Serum Alpha-Synuclein After Single Dose of PRX002. Roche is the parent company of SFBA's Genentech, a large biotech company based in South San Francisco.

From Brazil: "Mitomycin-treated undifferentiated embryonic stem cells as a safe and effective therapeutic strategy in a mouse model of Parkinson’s disease"

"Barker and many other researchers say toxins get taken up in the bowels of patients and that over the years these are slowly transported to the central nervous system until they become lodged in some of the cells of the brain. There, they ultimately wreak damage to cells of the mid-brain, where dopamine, a neurotransmitter involved in motor control, is made.

Prions were first proposed to be the causes of fatal brain diseases such as Creutzfeldt-Jakob in the 1980s, and have since been linked to a number of conditions affecting humans and animals... As to the identity of the protein transformed in Parkinson’s, the main candidate is alpha-synuclein, which is found in the brain, though its function is unclear. Recent research suggests it could be transformed into an abnormal state and play a key role in development of Parkinson’s."

The article reports on vaccine research already linked above, and fetal VM transplants where the transplanted tissue also developed Parkinson's.