A Medical Device Daily
Vesta Therapeutics (Durham, North Carolina) reported receiving a Phase I Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Grant from the National Institutes of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK), a division of the National Institutes of Health (NIH; Bethesda). The amount of the grant was not disclosed.
The grant will support exploring the use of adipose derived adult stem (ADAS) cells as a therapeutic modality in liver disease. The Phase I objective is to demonstrate the in vitroability of human ADAS cells to express hepatocytes or hepatic biliary cell differentiation markers in conjunction with expression of cytokines associated with liver regeneration. The planned Phase II will be a preclinical study aimed at demonstrating ADAS cell ability to enhance hepatic regeneration and repair in vivo. The grant is a collaboration between Vesta Therapeutics and the Pennington Biomedical Research Center atLouisiana State University(Baton Rouge, Louisiana)