Reliance Life to launch stem cell therapies soon

Reliance Life Sciences (RLS), the pioneer of embryonic stem cell research in the country, is likely to launch its first stem cell-based therapies for neuro-degenerated diseases, including Parkinson's and ocular diseases and spinal cord injury soon.

Considering the successful completion of the pre-clinical and clinical studies with due regulatory approval in another six months to one year period, these novel therapies are likely to be launched in the country by the end of next year, sources from the company said.

"As far as the embryonic stem cell group is concerned, a few of them are in the pre-clinical stage and the results are quite promising. We expect that most of our research efforts into the area of stem cells and regenerative medicines, including tissue engineering and molecular diagnostics, will reach the commercial stage in a year or two,"said K V Subramaniam, head, Reliance Life Sciences.

Mukesh Ambani-promoted life sciences company is targeting various therapeutic potentials of stem cells as renewable sources of replacement of cells and tissues to treat diseases and disabilities like Parkinson's and Alzhemer's diseases, spinal cord injury, strokes, burns, heart diseases, diabetes, osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis, among others.

Reliance Life, which had set up one of the largest domestic animal houses for drug trials at its new life sciences complex in Navi Mumbai, has added the rarest kind of animal trial facility using severe combined immune-deficient (SCID) mice to test the potential of stem cells isolated from human embryos.

With the help of SCID mice experimentation, scientists can not only test the safety profile of the cell line treatment but also the cell regenerative mechanism within the body to treat the deficiency in vivo.

The SCID mice facility at Reliance Life Science is learnt to be the first of its kind in Asia.

The company is currently growing pluripotent stem cell lines, isolated from human embryos, on an experimentation scale. As the trials progress successfully, the company will go in for scaling up the culturing and expanding the stem cell collection base.

According to Dr Aparna Khanna, head, embryonic stem cell group, Reliance Life Sciences, human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) are an exceptionally useful tool for studies of human development and represent a potential source for transplantation therapies.

"At present, only a limited number of hESCs lines representing a very small sample of genetic diversity of human population are available. At Reliance Life, the scientists have derived and characterised a new hESCs line, titled 'Relicell hESC1'. These cells, established from the ICM (inner cell mass) on MEF (mouse embryonic feeder) layer, satisfy the criteria that characterise pluripotent hESCs," she added.

The other novel area of research currently going on at the RLS centre is molecular diagnostics "� the use of diagnostic techniques to identify various proteins and bio-markers by examining samples at molecular level.

This offers predictive and preventive diagnostics, which can be seen as a step forward, wherein proteins are produced from abnormal genes by separating the DNA from a sample and analysing it. RLS' molecular diagnostic products, which help predict cervical cancer and ovarian cancer, have already hit the market.