Multipotent neural stem cell compositions

Patent Number: 7,361,505

Essentially, this patent covers: a) fetal and embryonic derived neurospheres; b) purified population of multipotent neural derived from juvenile or adult mammalian CNS tissue; and c) in vitro cell culture composition derived from mammalian CNS consisting of neurospheres.

Specific neurospheres include cells that resemble neuronal progenitor cells.  The phenotype of these is nestin postive, and negative for GFAP, myelin, and neurofilament.

Specific sources of cells in the adult brain include the subependymal region lining the ventricles in the forebrain, conus medullaris, thoracic spinal cord, brain stem, or hypothalamus. 

This patent is useful for entities interested in generation of neural stem cells and neurons of various types.  Some of the science behind this and even claims are used by the company StemCells Inc, which also has some interesting IP in the area of neurospheres.

View this patent on the USPTO website.