It has always been the belief of StemCellPatents.com that the future of stem cell therapeutics is not only in the development and use of stem cell types, but the integration of stem cells with other modalities to attain synergy. For example, while FDA/EMEA development of cellular product candidates takes years and hundreds of millions of dollars, the same, or very similar stem cell products are already commercialized clinically by off-shore institutions. Clinical results are impressive in some situations, however, numerous limitations still are found. Accordingly, we believe that the "cutting edge" of stem cell therapeutics will be mixing and matching therapeutic modalities with stem cells to attain synergies.
The current invention does exactly that. The invention covers the use of X-rays administered as "at least one array of microbeams comprising at least two parallel, spatially distinct microbeams" to deliver a therapeutic dose to injured spinal cord or brain tissue, with the idea that these X-rays will accelerate the healing of the microvasculature and glia at the injury site, as well as inhibit scarring.
Although it appears that no examples were provided in the patent, the author published a paper (Dilmanian et al. Tissue-sparing effect of x-ray microplanar beams particularly in the CNS: is a bystander effect involved? Exp Hematol. 2007 Apr;35(4 Suppl 1):69-77) describing that such microplanar beams may elicit cytokine production which could have therapeutic effects.
View this patent on the USPTO website.
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