Our medical stem cell experts can manipulate stem cells into becoming specific types of cells. This process of differentiation is done in our stem cell laboratory. Once this is done successfully, stem cells may be used to regenerate and repair tissues and organs, to treat diseases and conditions such as ALS, Alzheimer’s, multiple sclerosis, diabetes, heart failure, Parkinson’s disease, inherited genetic diseases or spinal cord injuries. Stem cells could also be grown to become organs to use in transplants, since donor organs are often in short supply. Stem cell treatment, on account of its regenerative process, will be a useful agent against ageing. Stem cells will also one day be useful in testing experimental medications and drugs before human clinical trials, rather than using animal models.
Stem cells are manipulated to make them differentiate into specific types of cells, such as heart muscle cells, blood cells or nerve cells. This manipulation involves changing the media or material in which the stem cells are cultured. During the course of stem cell treatment these specialized cells are then transplanted or transferred into a person. If the person has heart disease, the stem cells would be injected into the heart muscle or into the circulation; the normally functioning heart stem cells are thought to replace the defective heart cells. Similarly stem cell treatment can be shown to impede and slow the ageing process by regenerating skin cells and organs.
The stem cells we use come from the blood left behind in the placenta and cord after a baby is delivered. (1)This blood has been formed by the cells contained in the newborn. The stem cells contained in this blood are stem cells left over from this process of creation and would normally be discarded. This means that we have the building blocks of human beings available to repair and rejuvenate diseased human tissue.
Stem cells are thought to work within the body in several ways. These are :
1. Plasticity – this is thought to represent the potential to change into other cell types like nerve cells (2)
2. Recruitment – to then travel to the site of tissue damage (3,4)
3. Grafting – to become integral to the host’s own tissues and to unite with other tissues (5)
The theoretical view is that the injected stem cells travel to the site of disease, attracted by specific neurotransmitters and cytokines which are inflammatory cells of the immune system. Stem cells will integrate with the diseased tissue by the process of grafting and transform into the same cells and tissue by displaying the property of plasticity or differentiation. Thus it is essential in stem cell treatments to use the correct stem cells that have commenced the differentiation process toward the target tissue and organ.
The rest of the injected stem cells, which have not been recruited or grafted, will travel to the bone marrow where they will be stored until such time as the appropriate signals for their release occurs. They can still respond, from the bone marrow, to signals from damaged tissue elsewhere in the body and migrate to new areas of disease. This may be why responses are sometimes noticed a few months after treatment.
Adult cells can be altered to have properties of embryonic stem cells. In late 2007 two groups of researchers reported that they had created stem cells from skin cells in laboratory studies. By altering the genes in the skin cells, researchers were able to reprogram the cells to act similarly to embryonic stem cells. The technique of altering adult cells involves processes that may be safe for use in people. Whether this new type of stem cell can be as useful as embryonic stem cells remains to be seen. These are called induced Pluripotent Stem Cells and although in the very early stages of research, may become a very important type of stem cell.
References:
1 Riordan NH, Chan K, Marleau AM, Ichim TE. Cord blood in regenerative medicine: Do we need immune suppression? J Transl Med. 2007 Jan 30;5(1):8.
2. Aubin, J. E., & Triffitt, J. (2002). Messenchymal stem cells and the osteoblast lineage. In J. P. Bilezikian, L. G. Raisz & G. A. Rodan (Eds.), Principals of Bone Biology (2 ed., pp. 59-81).
3. Mueller FJ, McKercher SR, Imitola J, Loring JF, Yip S, Khoury SJ, Snyder EY. At the interface of the immune system and the nervous system: how neuroinflammation modulates the fate of neural progenitors in vivo. Ernst Schering Res Found Workshop. 2005;(53):83-114.
4. A joint effort led by stem cell biologist Evan Y. Snyder, M.D., Ph.D., of The Burnham Institute, and Samia J. Khoury, M.D., of Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital™, report data suggesting that stem cells use inflammatory signals to know where they must home. http://www.burnham.org/default.asp?contentID=83. Inflammation Directs Stem Cells to Injured Tissue Dec 16, 2004.
5. Kofidis, T., de Bruin, J. L., Yamane, T., Balsam, L. B., Lebl, D. R., Swijnenburg, R.-J., Tanaka, M., Weissman, I. L., and Robbins, R. C. (2004). Insulin-Like Growth Factor Promotes Engraftment, Differentiation, and Functional Improvement after Transfer of Embryonic Stem Cells for Myocardial Restoration . Stem Cells 22 , 1239-1245
