Nat Med: The use of metformin to stimulate the toothed back nerve stem cells is expected to treat brain damage in children.

!--:pagetitle,1020 /PRNewswire ---/ -- In a new study, researchers from the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto, Canada, and researchers in Toronto, Canada, have found that one day people can use endogenous stem cells in the brain to repair brain damage by conducting a cross-species study of metformin, a common drug used to treat type 2 diabetes.
related findings were published online July 27, 2020 in the journal Medicine Nature, with the title "Assessment cognitive of the and recovery in survivors of the survivors of the brain brain tumors in a pilot clinical trial trial metform using formin".
images from Nature Medicine, 2020, doi: 10.1038/s41591-020-0985-2. "No one has ever found that you can take a drug known to act on endogenous stem cells, potentially inducing brain growth and active recovery," said Dr. Donald Mabbott, co-author of the
paper and head of the Neuroscience and Mental Health Program at The Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto.
" Mabbott said metformin could be a potential for change in how to treat brain damage in children. "We're really moving from the 'Let's help children control and compensate for their brain damage', " he said, "and we're actually treating brain damage in a positive way by using the brain's own ability to repair itself."

" this study shows that metformin has a positive gender-dependent effect on nerve development (i.e. the growth of neurons in the brain) and cognition in rodents, and also proves that it is safe in the human body and can continue to enter Phase III clinical trials in the body.
the human participants in the study were survivors of brain tumors in children who had received cranial brain radiation. "Compared to most studies, this study is very novel because it looks at both animal models and human participants," said Professor Cindi Morshead, co-author of the
paper and a researcher at the Donnelly Cell and Biomolecular Research Center at The Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto.
our preclinical work in animal models will provide information on the current design of this new study to help the brain recover from damage.
" Morshead said she was excited not only with the promising results of the study, but also with the way it was transformed into a clinical design. "There are a lot of preclinical models that are not high in value--- drugs go into clinical trials, but they don't succeed in moving on to the next stage," said Morshead,
.
this can be devastating for a number of reasons.
I think combining human and animal research will really facilitate the transformation of this study into human clinical trials.
" In a previous multidisciplinary project, Professor Gary Bader of the Donnelly Cell and Biomolecular Research Center at Toronto Hospital's Sick Children's Hospital and others used single-cell genomics to map the brain's development over time.
by understanding the neural circuits that control the growth of brain tissue, they have discovered compounds that stimulate endogenous stem cells in the brain to promote the repair of brain tissue, including metformin. "I'm very excited about this paper because it describes a potential endogenous stem cell therapy for treating currently untreatable brain diseases," said Freda Miller, co-author of the
paper and a senior scientist in the Neuroscience and Mental Health Program at The Hospital of Sick Children in Toronto.
equally important, the story of metformin provides a classic example of why we need to support basic research and why it is essential to do research in collaborative teams.
metformin recruited endogenous brain stem cells from basic research on how stem cells develop, and then pushed them into animal models and humans by highly interdisciplinary scientists and clinicians such as Dr. Morshead and Dr. Mabbott.
" this study provides important evidence that stimulating endogenous stem cells is a viable method of tissue repair when regeneration is not easy to occur.
given that metformin is an approved drug, the time for further clinical testing and regulatory approval may be accelerated.
results from rodent and human clinical trials have provided information for a Phase III clinical trial for survivors of brain tumours in children who have undergone craniofacial radiation therapy, currently being conducted in 14 hospitals in Canada and Australia.
in the lab, the researchers found that metformin enhances the recovery of endogenous neuroprecursor cells (neural cell, NPC) in the toothed reflux, where toothre is part of the brain and plays a key role in learning and memory.
however, the results obtained are gender-dependent.
metformin is sufficient to save nerve activity and behavior in female rodents, but not in male rodents.
in addition to laboratory studies, the researchers also studied 24 survivors of brain tumours in children who received craniofacial radiation therapy and found that metformin was safe to use, no significant adverse events were reported, and the population was well tolerated.
Mabbott and Morshead both say their research is aimed not only at activating endogenous stem cells in the brain to repair damage, but also because they want to provide hope for vulnerable groups. "As a clinical psychologist, I've worked in patient families for 20 years, and what really motivates me is the family, the family that has got me up to the challenge," says
.
my job is to tell parents that while their children's brain cancer has been successfully treated, their children will have learning problems, cognitive impairments, and some will never be able to live independently, at a cost.
one of the parents said to me, 'It's not good enough, you have to find a way to help our children recover better.'
', that's what motivated me to start researching how to use brain plasticity to repair. "Until recently, our aftercare program simply helped very little for children who sufferfrom radiation therapy in the brain," said Eric Bouffet, co-author of the
and director of the Hematology/Oncology Brain Tumor Project at The Hospital of Sick Children in Toronto.
this study suggests that we can repair some of the damage associated with brain radiation, and that children with brain tumors around the world could potentially benefit from this finding.
the !--/ewebeditor: !-- webeditor: !--:page title" - Morshead says the significance of the study is not just for child brain tumor survivors.
the researchers are also studying metformin and cerebral palsy, as well as the use of metformin as a preventive treatment for cranial radiation.
(bioon.com) References: 1.Ramy Ayoub et al. Assessment of the cognitive and recovery in the survivors of the brain brain brain tumors in a pilot clinical trial using metformin. Nature Medicine, 2020, doi: 10.1038/s41591-020-0985-2.2.Erin M. Gibson et al. Treating cancer thecancer - cognitive cognitive. Nature Medicine, 2020, doi: 10.1038/s41591-020-1014-1.3.Drug of the neural cell stem styth to the ford on treatment treatment of the