June 7, 2016
(Medical Xpress) – Bone marrow transplantation currently is the only curative therapy for these blood diseases. But, for the new, transplanted stem cells to do their work, the faulty stem cells must first be “evicted” or killed. Accomplishing that requires patients endure chemotherapy and radiation—a vicious assault on the body with life-long consequences. In a study recently published in the journal Nature Biotechnology, HSCI researchers at Harvard University and Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), in collaboration with Boston Children’s Hospital and Dana Farber Cancer Institute, have developed a non-toxic transplantation procedure using antibodies to specifically target blood stem cells in mice, an approach they hope will make blood stem cell transplants for these patients far less toxic.
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