About Dra. Almudena Ramon Cueto

[Isildur]

Is not the same, dra.cueto works with glia of olfatory bulb, and dr.lima with olfatory mucosa. The source of cells, the quality of glia, and the regenerative potencial isn´t the same.

[KIM]

Well all ended up with a meeting in which high level researchers claim that Dra. Almudena Ramon Cueto´s research is irrelevant therefore shutdown, in six years she hasn´t produced anything that may be of any use to the improvement of SCI.

[Wise Young]

Monkey experiments are not easy to do. That is what I understand Dr. Ramon-Cueto has been doing for the past five or six years. She worked very hard to establish a monkey spinal cord injury model and a system for caring for the monkeys. In terms of productivity, I agree that she has not published much in the past five years. I presume that she has lost her grant support for doing the studies.

Regarding olfactory ensheathing glial studies, I think that we should not be so eager to shut down that research avenue based on Carlos Lima. As I have pointed out on many occasions, it is not at all clear that Carlos Lima is transplanting olfactory ensheathing glia into the spinal cord. He and his colleagues have been cutting out part of the spinal cord and implanting pieces of nasal mucosa into the spinal cord. These may or may not contain any olfactory ensheathing glia.

Dr. McKay-Sims in Brisbane has transplanted adult olfactory ensheathing glial cells grown from the nasal mucosa into people. These are the patient's own cells and the results of these transplants have not yet been reported. These are from the same patients and should not be rejected. It would be of great interest and importance to find out the results of that study.

Dr. Huang in Beijing Xishan and several other hospitals in China, as well as Novosibirsk in Russia, have been transplanting fetal olfactory ensheathing glia from aborted fetuses into the spinal cord. Because these are not immunologically matched, they are likely to be rejected.

Wise.

[ChipD]

Originally Posted by Wise Young

Monkey experiments are not easy to do. That is what I understand Dr. Ramon-Cueto has been doing for the past five or six years. She worked very hard to establish a monkey spinal cord injury model and a system for caring for the monkeys. In terms of productivity, I agree that she has not published much in the past five years. I presume that she has lost her grant support for doing the studies.

Regarding olfactory ensheathing glial studies, I think that we should not be so eager to shut down that research avenue based on Carlos Lima. As I have pointed out on many occasions, it is not at all clear that Carlos Lima is transplanting olfactory ensheathing glia into the spinal cord. He and his colleagues have been cutting out part of the spinal cord and implanting pieces of nasal mucosa into the spinal cord. These may or may not contain any olfactory ensheathing glia.

Dr. McKay-Sims in Brisbane has transplanted adult olfactory ensheathing glial cells grown from the nasal mucosa into people. These are the patient's own cells and the results of these transplants have not yet been reported. These are from the same patients and should not be rejected. It would be of great interest and importance to find out the results of that study.

Dr. Huang in Beijing Xishan and several other hospitals in China, as well as Novosibirsk in Russia, have been transplanting fetal olfactory ensheathing glia from aborted fetuses into the spinal cord. Because these are not immunologically matched, they are likely to be rejected.

Wise.

Dr Young,
I just don't get it. Why do Dr's use cells for transplantation into the spinal cord that are likely to be rejected. If I put gasoline into my engine when I change the oil, my engine won't run long. Common sense! If you put foreign cells into the body, they get rejected and won't work. Common Sense! So why use an approach that likely won't work to start with? This is science that is established with known results, aren't they just waisting time?

[Wise Young]

Originally Posted by ChipD

Dr Young,
I just don't get it. Why do Dr's use cells for transplantation into the spinal cord that are likely to be rejected. If I put gasoline into my engine when I change the oil, my engine won't run long. Common sense! If you put foreign cells into the body, they get rejected and won't work. Common Sense! So why use an approach that likely won't work to start with? This is science that is established with known results, aren't they just waisting time?

ChipD, that is because they believe the cells won't be rejected. This is the reasoning behind the Geron trial as well. Wise.

[KIM]

Wise
Dra. Cueto has the grants and the monkeys, but the way she conducted her investigations haven´t been credible for the board that evaluated her research. I don´t know if it is a politics decision or if it is really that she is cheating. The general feeling here is of delusion, a lot of people had faith in her work and didn´t expect this outcome.

[Wise Young]

Originally Posted by KIM

Wise
Dra. Cueto has the grants and the monkeys, but the way she conducted her investigations haven´t been credible for the board that evaluated her research. I don´t know if it is a politics decision or if it is really that she is cheating. The general feeling here is of delusion, a lot of people had faith in her work and didn´t expect this outcome.

KIM, I am surprised. If she had the grants, that means that some science funding agency or foundation believes that her work is good enough to fund. Is this the institutional animal use and care committee? I can't imagine that this is related to "cheating". Who is the "board"?

wise.

[KIM]

Wise
The board that has taken this decision has a conservative profile I don´t have the info to judge their decision, perhaps you can , from the outside, find out.
Spain is a country where politics like to mingle in all fields and decisions don´t have much to do with knowledge rather more with politics or strategies to bust opposite parties.

[Isildur]

All around this case is so dark and unclear.
I don´t see any proof that her work was irrelevant, and the resons to stop her research are empty and never scientific. The committee that judges her work are formed by people with no direct relation with SCI research field except manuel nieto sampedro, but they never give a scientif reason that support the end of the research. Its strange.
In this decision there are more politic reasons than scientific realitys, sad but true.

[Wise Young]

Originally Posted by Isildur

All around this case is so dark and unclear.
I don´t see any proof that her work was irrelevant, and the resons to stop her research are empty and never scientific. The committee that judges her work are formed by people with no direct relation with SCI research field except manuel nieto sampedro, but they never give a scientif reason that support the end of the research. Its strange.
In this decision there are more politic reasons than scientific realitys, sad but true.

Isildur,

This is really strange. I know Manuel Nieto-Sampedro, too. He is a good man and scientist.

This must have been a committee called by Ramon-Cueto's university. Faculty members are not supposed to be affected by politics.

Wise.