Publisher's Synopsis
Dr. Greg Maguire's thought-provoking book offers a radically new approach to the standard means of developing drugs through the use of the molecules that stem cells release. Emphasizing that living organisms operate through the collective actions of entities within and between all levels of the biological organism, including the quantum level, molecular level, and cellular level, for example, the argument is put forth that drug development, and medicine itself, must treat various indications by understanding and then treating the collective actions at the relevant levels that are found to be perturbed in that particular indication. Motivated by the recent successes in the fields of quantum collective electrodynamics and condensed matter physics, where systems level thinking has explained through mathematical and conceptual reasoning how these phenomenon work, and doing so with heuristic outcomes, Maguire argues that the same system level thinking must be applied to drug development and medicine. The interactive nature of these fundamental collective processes is at the core of developing systems therapeutics and, as such, challenges those that believe in fundamental reductionism, where understanding the components of the system will explain the system. During these times, fundamental reductionism is often used to explain diseases as the result of an aberration in a DNA sequence, and targeted approaches to drug development lead to the development of small molecules to specifically target only one pathway. Because of this, there is an understanding that diseases and other indications are multifactorial and often don't involve a genomic alteration; systems biology analysis should lead to systems therapeutics where multiple pathways, often at different levels of the organism, are targeted by the therapeutic aspects. The therapeutic development approach that Maguire explains is a result of reverse engineering endogenous adult stem cell function that serves to maintain and heal our tissues. Using the pools of molecules that different types of adult stem cells release, each pool of molecules being tissue specific for the indication to be treated, Maguire describes the systems therapeutic results. The book is divided into nine sections, each of which can be read as a standalone chapter and serve as a source of references on the particular topic. Although some of the topics use mathematical formulas, none of the material requires mathematical rigor in order to understand the concepts. The last chapter culminates in showing how the systems therapeutic approach using the molecules from adult stem cells is used to treat neurodegeneration.
