Dr. Jonah Sacha and colleagues at OHSU's Vaccine & Gene Therapy Institute are among the many scientists who are seeking to understand why the much-studied "Berlin patient" was so fortunate. Now, they've developed a new way to understand his cure. Sacha's team has shown a species of monkey called Mauritian cynomolgus macaques can successfully receive stem cell transplants.

Researchers have long used a different monkey species to research stem cell transplants, but that species' biological characteristics means it can't be reliably used to find good donor matches to mimic human stem transplants.

In a paper published Nov. 10 in the journal Nature Communications, Sacha and colleagues report they successfully performed stem transplants on two monkeys more than a year ago that continue to lead healthy lives today. The recipients did not suffer from the many common adverse effects of stem transplants, including the grueling graft-versus-host disease, which can cause severe liver damage, rashes, diarrhea and even death.

The finding provides Sacha a critical tool needed to explore how the Berlin patient was cured. As a result of the finding, researchers can also use Mauritian cynomolgus macaques to improve stem cell transplant outcomes for human patients with other blood-related conditions such as leukemia and sickle-cell disease.

Story Source:

Materials provided by Oregon Health & Science University. Original written by Franny White. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.

Journal Reference:

1. Benjamin J. Burwitz, Helen L. Wu, Shaheed Abdulhaqq, Christine Shriver-Munsch, Tonya Swanson, Alfred W. Legasse, Katherine B. Hammond, Stephanie L. Junell, Jason S. Reed, Benjamin N. Bimber, Justin M. Greene, Gabriela M. Webb, Mina Northrup, Wolfram Laub, Paul Kievit, Rhonda MacAllister, Michael K. Axthelm, Rebecca Ducore, Anne Lewis, Lois M. A. Colgin, Theodore Hobbs, Lauren D. Martin, Betsy Ferguson, Charles R. Thomas, Angela Panoskaltsis-Mortari, Gabrielle Meyers, Jeffrey J. Stanton, Richard T. Maziarz, Jonah B. Sacha. Allogeneic stem cell transplantation in fully MHC-matched Mauritian cynomolgus macaques recapitulates diverse human clinical outcomes. Nature Communications, 2017; 8 (1) DOI: 10.1038/s41467-017-01631-z