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Stem Cells from Muscle Can Repair Nerve Damage After Injury, Pitt Researchers Show

In some ground-breaking research, scientists have been able to use stem cells derived from human muscle tissue to repair nerve damage and restore function after injury to sciatic nerves.
And, even after 12 weeks, the regenerated nerve looked and functioned as a normal nerve.
Link to Story:
http://www.upmc.com/media/NewsReleases/2014/Pages/pitt-study-stem-cells-repair-nerve-damage.aspx
Stem cells
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Stem cells are undifferentiated biological cells, that can differentiate into specialized cells and can divide (through mitosis) to produce more stem cells. They are found in multicellular organisms. In mammals, there are two broad types of stem cells: embryonic stem cells, which are isolated from the inner cell mass of blastocysts, and adult stem cells, which are found in various tissues. In adult organisms, stem cells and progenitor cells act as a repair system for the body, replenishing adult tissues. In a developing embryo, stem cells can differentiate into all the specialized cells—ectoderm, endoderm and mesoderm (see induced pluripotent stem cells)—but also maintain the normal turnover of regenerative organs, such as blood, skin, or intestinal tissues.
There are three accessible sources of autologous adult stem cells in humans:
- Bone marrow, which requires extraction by harvesting, that is, drilling into bone (typically the femur or iliac crest),
- Adipose tissue (lipid cells), which requires extraction by liposuction, and
- Blood, which requires extraction through pheresis, wherein blood is drawn from the donor (similar to a blood donation), passed through a machine that extracts the stem cells and returns other portions of the blood to the donor.
Stem cells can also be taken from umbilical cord blood just after birth. Of all stem cell types, autologous harvesting involves the least risk. By definition, autologous cells are obtained from one’s own body, just as one may bank his or her own blood for elective surgical procedures.
Highly plastic adult stem cells are routinely used in medical therapies, for example in bone marrow transplantation. Stem cells can now be artificially grown and transformed (differentiated) into specialized cell types with characteristics consistent with cells of various tissues such as muscles or nerves through cell culture. Embryonic cell lines and autologous embryonic stem cells generated through therapeutic cloning have also been proposed as promising candidates for future therapies. Research into stem cells grew out of findings by Ernest A. McCulloch and James E. Till at the University of Toronto in the 1960s
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Medical researchers believe that stem cell therapy has the potential to dramatically change the treatment of human disease. A number of adult stem cell therapies already exist, particularly bone marrow transplants that are used to treat leukemia. In the future, medical researchers anticipate being able to use technologies derived from stem cell research to treat a wider variety of diseases including cancer, Parkinson’s disease, spinal cord injuries, Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, multiple sclerosis, and muscle damage, amongst a number of other impairments and conditions. However, there still exists a great deal of social and scientific uncertainty surrounding stem cell research, which could possibly be overcome through public debate and future research, and further education of the public.
One concern of treatment is the risk that transplanted stem cells could form tumors and become cancerous if cell division continues uncontrollably.
Stem cells are widely studied, for their potential therapeutic use and for their inherent interest.
Supporters of embryonic stem cell research argue that such research should be pursued because the resultant treatments could have significant medical potential. It has been proposed that surplus embryos created for in vitro fertilization could be donated with consent and used for the research.
The recent development of iPS cells has been called a bypass of the legal controversy. Laws limiting the destruction of human embryos have been credited for being the reason for development of iPS cells, but it is still not completely clear whether hiPS cells are equivalent to hES cells. Recent work demonstrates hotspots of aberrant epigenomic reprogramming in hiPS cells (Lister, R., et al., 2011).
Pluripotent, embryonic stem cells originate as inner cell mass (ICM) cells within a blastocyst. These stem cells can become any tissue in the body, excluding a placenta. Only cells from an earlier stage of the embryo, known as the morula, are totipotent, able to become all tissues in the body and the extraembryonic placenta
FDA Approves Investigational MS Trial
The stem cell research division of the Tisch MS Research Center of New York announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved autologous, mesenchymal stem cell-derived neural progenitor cells (MSC-NPs) as an Investigational New Drug (IND) for an open label, phase 1 clinical trial in the treatment of multiple sclerosis.