Stem Cells, Everything You Wanted To Know But Were Afraid to Ask

DANIEL KRAFT, MD

Stem cell technology and the debate surrounding it has generated a great deal of excitement and controversy in recent years. The field is surrounded by misconceptions, hype and yet very significant potential. In this short talk at BIL we'll discuss: defining what are stem cells really and where do they come from... the differences between embryonic stem cells and 'adult stem cells' (i.e. derived from our own bone marrow, fat,  umbilical cord blood, placentas, reprogrammed skin cells,  and even our kids teeth) and emerging technologies to utilize these cells in powerful and novel ways.  We'll cover current clinical uses of stem cells, ongoing clinical trials in  regenerative medicine (i.e. using marrow derived cells to treat cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, and diseases of the nervous system such as stroke & Parkinson's), upcoming trials utilizing embryonic stem cells, and some of the likely near term and future applications as well as challenges  remaining in order for this field to reach its full potential. This will be a shorter version of this talk given recently at Google HQ as as 'Google TechTalk' which  you can also watch online.

Daniel Kraft is a Stanford & Harvard trained physician-scientist with extensive research and clinical experience. Now on faculty at Stanford, as well as at UCSF on the Bone Marrow Transplant service, his work has focused on developing novel techologies and medical devices utilizing stem cells for the treatment of cancer and for use in a widening array of regenerative therapies.

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