Posted: 18 September 2024
The Australian Government is investing $34.5 million in research funding to trial new treatments and therapies aiming to harness the power of stem cells to improve patient outcomes.
Research advances over the past 10 years have shown the potential to develop new treatments using stem cells. Stem cells may restore function to damaged tissues, be used to create new tissues and organs or boost the body’s ability to heal itself.
Melbourne-based company Magellan Stem Cells will receive $7 million to conduct large phase three clinical trials with hundreds of Australians, that will test a promising technology that uses donor stem cells to treat and potentially halt the damage caused by knee joint osteoarthritis.
One in five Australians over 45 suffer with osteoarthritis. No current therapies delay the progression of osteoarthritis, and an increasing number of patients undergo total knee replacement surgery.
Another project will develop a world-first treatment to restore function after a spinal cord injury by transplanting stem cells, with a team from Griffith University receiving $6.8 million in research funding.
As well as developing promising therapies, human stem cells can also be used in the laboratory to better understand what happens to the body during disease. This allows researchers to develop and test new drugs with much greater speed and accuracy than conventional approaches, and without risk to patients.
Brain research institute The Florey will receive nearly $5 million to progress their work to find an effective treatment for Motor Neuron Disease, developing a world-first drug screening technology using patient stem cells to test whether potential treatments can keep motor neurons alive.
A total of six projects will share in $34.5 million from the Medical Research Future Fund’s (MRFF) Stem Cell Therapies Research Grant Opportunity.
Read the full grant list here.
Quotes attributable to Minister Butler:
“We are living through a supercharged period of discovery in health and medical research, and the Albanese Government is proud to support Australia’s world class researchers.
“Stem cell therapies could provide innovative treatments for many chronic and inherited diseases we can’t yet treat effectively. Such therapies could also revolutionise how we test and develop new medications.
“These six projects are truly exciting and hold the promise of new treatments for diverse diseases and conditions like osteoarthritis, spinal cord injury and Motor Neuron Disease, among others.”
