St. John's News

Frank Barile, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Pharmaceutical Sciences in St. John’s University’s College of Pharmacy and Allied Health Services, has been awarded a $36,000 grant from the Alternatives Research and Development Foundation to continue his research on mouse embryonic stem cells, cementing his place at the forefront of the race to cure diseases and prolong lives using stem-cell science.

Much has been made lately by policymakers, lobbyists, religious leaders and the media about the ethics of scientific research that relies on the destruction of human embryos. Earlier this year, however, news reports swirled about a new, hopeful direction of embryonic science that utilizes mouse stem cells rather than human stem cells, effectively putting to rest certain ethical concerns.
 
While most media outlets began publicizing these advancements about five months ago, Dr. Barile and his team of graduate students have been working with mouse stem cells for nearly two years, conducting “backstage research” before it gained public traction, says the St. John’s professor.

Barile admits he’s excited to be on the cutting-edge of technology that adheres to all forms of ethical guidelines. “Once in a while, about every 10 years or so, you get to a point in your research career where it makes a big splash and produces a couple of headlines,” he says. “We’re at the right place at the right time.”

“It’s gratifying to know that we were doing the nuts and bolts of this [mouse stem cell] research before other people in the scientific world started jumping on the bandwagon,” adds Ph.D. student Tony Calabro, from Bethpage, NY, who has been working with Barile for three years and recently received a $12,500, third-year renewal on a fellowship from the Chicago-based International Foundation of Ethical Research.

Calabro, who also serves as a research technician at North Shore University Hospital in Manhasset in the early morning hours before coming to Barile’s lab, will be credited as the first author of a soon-to-be-published paper, written with Barile, describing their recent discoveries in their lab. It will appear in an upcoming edition of Toxicology in Vitro.

Inside the Laboratory
At the crux of Barile’s new research is the discovery that mouse embryonic stem cells, when artificially manipulated, have the capacity to transform into intact biomembranes, or cell tissues, while other normal and cancerous human cells do not. Specifically, Barile and his graduate students believe they have found a way to chemically “program” mouse stem cells to develop into tissues resembling human skin cells and certain membranous stomach cells, such as those found in organs like the large and small intestines. (Skin and stomach lining are very similar in terms of their development process, says Barile.)

The simplified methodological process used by the researchers involves a series of steps and the acquisition of three items: “imports,” which are filter-like objects that bear resemblance to the permeable membranes that naturally anchor human cells; various “growth factors,” or hormones, which are very expensive; and the mouse stem cells themselves.

After culturing the cells, Barile pairs them with a certain combination of growth factors, stimulating the cells’ genes, which in turn alters their development. Stem cells, depending on the combination of growth factors they are paired with, have the potential to develop into a multitude of different organs — a liver, gall bladder or kidney, for example. 

“We try to mimic [membranous] organs in the intestinal tract, where you have cells on one side, and a filter-like structure on the other side, which absorbs water,” says Barile, explaining the importance of the imports he uses.

Barile hopes that his artificial cell models eventually can be used to replace damaged, cancerous or surgically removed cell tissues in the human body. Ultimately, this research could lead to the cures of major diseases such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s, which are caused by cell damage. Heart attacks might also one day be prevented with stem-cell science, says Barile.

If his homegrown cell cultures ultimately transform into skin cells rather than stomach cells, the lives of millions of burn victims might eventually be saved, he adds.

Barile says his ultimate goal “is simply to make a contribution to science, which can save lives, or at least make lives a little easier.”

Toxicology Roots
Because Barile is a toxicologist, a further purpose of his research is to explore the way in which different toxicants, such as heavy metals, can interfere with the artificial manipulation of cells.

“After many years of developing in vitro models as alternative methods to animal testing, there still are no validated procedures to determine systemic toxicity in vitro,” he says.

Barile was awarded his ARDF grant at the beginning of the fall semester. He recently presented his findings to a national audience of 7,500 at the annual meeting of the Society of Toxicology.

Barile has worked with the development of in vitro models for toxicology for about 20 years and recently published a book titled Principles of Toxicology Testing. He teaches an assortment of graduate and undergraduate courses in toxicology and pharmacy.