'Stem Cell Revolutions - A Vision of the Future' has been announced the winner of the Best Documentary award at Vedere la Scienza Festival 2012 - the 16th edition of the international festival of science film, video and documentary in Milan, Italy.

Scientists have shed light on how the liver repairs itself with research that could help develop drugs to treat liver disease.

Researchers at the Medical Research Council (MRC) Centre for Regenerative Medicine at the University of Edinburgh have discovered how to enhance the production of key cells needed to repair damaged liver tissue.

A new cell culture method that dramatically reduces the numbers of mice needed to test potential treatments for nerve cells damaged by multiple sclerosis has won its inventors a prize from the National Centre for the Replacement, Refinement and Reduction of Animals in Research (NC3Rs).

Embryonic stem cell colony in a petri dish. Image by Fella Hammachi.Scientists have found a way to generate and maintain stem cells much more efficiently by amplifying the effect of an essential protein.

Researchers from Denmark, Scotland and the USA have created synthetic versions of a protein, which manipulates adult cells – such as skin cells – so that they can subsequently revert to an earlier, embryonic like state.  These reverted cells have the potential to become any cell in the body.

Scotland signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Californian Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) on Thursday 19 January 2012.