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Stem cell therapy may offer hope for acute lung injury
October 29, 2009Researchers at the University of Illinois at Chicago College of Medicine have shown that adult stem cells from bone marrow can prevent acute lung injury in a mouse model of the disease.
Their results are reported online in the October issue of the journal Stem Cells.
Acute lung injury (ALI) is responsible for an estimated 74,500 deaths in the U.S. each year. ALI can be caused by any major inflammation or injury to the lungs and is a major cause of death in patients in hospital ICUs. There is no effective drug treatment.
In ALI, the layer of cells that forms the lining of the blood vessels surrounding the lung's air sacs is damaged, allowing fluid to leak in and fill the sacs. Repair of these breaks in the endothelium, or lining, is complicated by the fact that endothelial cells are long-lived, says Kishore Wary, UIC assistant professor of pharmacology and lead author of the study. Turnover of new cells takes as long as two to five years, and few of the precursor cells needed for replacement circulate in the body at any given time.
"The stem cells that might be able repair the damage caused by ALI are simply not on hand," he said.
Wary and his colleagues were able to identify progenitor stem cells in the bone marrow of mice that could prevent and treat experimentally-induced ALI. These progenitor stem cells, named Flk-1 and CD34 for the proteins on their surfaces, constitute a very small percentage of the stem cell population in the bone marrow, but the researchers were able to develop a way of culturing the cells that increased their numbers and their "stickiness."
The stem cells stud their surface with molecules called integrins that allow the cells to stick to their targets and affect the repair. "Increasing this capacity for stickiness in our culture system was likely to make the stem cells more effective in repair," Wary said.
When mice that had been injected with a compound that causes ALI were injected with the purified and cultured Flk and CD34 stem cells, the progenitor cells were able to repair the lung injury, prevent fluid build-up, and led to improved survival.
The mouse disease model not only demonstrated that stem cell treatment is a promising therapy for ALI, Wary said, "but also provided us with the means to understand how these progenitor cells did their repair work. These therapeutic cells employed integrins to stick to the site of injury and turn on cellular and molecular repair machinery," he said.
The researchers hope to explore the possibility of using stem cell therapy in human acute lung injury.
University of Illinois at Chicago
In ALI, the layer of cells that forms the lining of the blood vessels surrounding the lung's air sacs is damaged, allowing fluid to leak in and fill the sacs. Repair of these breaks in the endothelium, or lining, is complicated by the fact that endothelial cells are long-lived, says Kishore Wary, UIC assistant professor of pharmacology and lead author of the study. Turnover of new cells takes as long as two to five years, and few of the precursor cells needed for replacement circulate in the body at any given time.
"The stem cells that might be able repair the damage caused by ALI are simply not on hand," he said.
Wary and his colleagues were able to identify progenitor stem cells in the bone marrow of mice that could prevent and treat experimentally-induced ALI. These progenitor stem cells, named Flk-1 and CD34 for the proteins on their surfaces, constitute a very small percentage of the stem cell population in the bone marrow, but the researchers were able to develop a way of culturing the cells that increased their numbers and their "stickiness."
The stem cells stud their surface with molecules called integrins that allow the cells to stick to their targets and affect the repair. "Increasing this capacity for stickiness in our culture system was likely to make the stem cells more effective in repair," Wary said.
When mice that had been injected with a compound that causes ALI were injected with the purified and cultured Flk and CD34 stem cells, the progenitor cells were able to repair the lung injury, prevent fluid build-up, and led to improved survival.
The mouse disease model not only demonstrated that stem cell treatment is a promising therapy for ALI, Wary said, "but also provided us with the means to understand how these progenitor cells did their repair work. These therapeutic cells employed integrins to stick to the site of injury and turn on cellular and molecular repair machinery," he said.
The researchers hope to explore the possibility of using stem cell therapy in human acute lung injury.
University of Illinois at Chicago
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The largest national stem cell study for heart disease showed the first evidence that transplanting a potent form of adult stem cells into the heart muscle of subjects with severe angina results in less pain and an improved ability to walk. The transplant subjects also experienced fewer deaths than those who didn't receive stem cells.
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Paradoxical protein might prevent cancer
One difficulty with fighting cancer cells is that they are similar in many respects to the body's stem cells. By focusing on the differences, researchers at Karolinska Institutet have found a new way of tackling colon cancer. The study is presented in the prestigious journal Cell.
U of M researchers find 2 units of umbilical cord blood reduce risk of leukemia recurrence
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The use of stem cells in regenerative medicine is not always beneficial for human health, it may even be harmful according to a work done by the University of Granada and University of León. Scientists have demonstrated that transplantation of human mononuclear cells isolated from umbilical cord blood exerted a deleterious effect in rats with liver cirrhosis.
Penn Study Provides First Clear Idea of How Rare Bone Disease Progresses
An international team of scientists, led by researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, is taking the first step in developing a treatment for a rare genetic disorder called fibrodysplasia ossificans progressiva (FOP), in which the body's skeletal muscles and soft connective tissue turns to bone, immobilizing patients over a lifetime with a second skeleton.
Iowa State University researcher discovers key to vital DNA, protein interaction
A researcher at Iowa State University has discovered how a group of proteins from plant pathogenic bacteria interact with DNA in the plant cell, opening up the possibility for what the scientist calls a "cascade of advances."
Scientists successfully reprogram blood cells
Researchers have transplanted genetically modified hematopoietic stem cells into mice so that their developing red blood cells produce a critical lysosomal enzyme -preventing or reducing organ and central nervous system damage from the often-fatal genetic disorder Hurler's syndrome.
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