Clinical uses of mesenchymal stem cells

Adult mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) are being used by researchers in the fields of regenerative medicine and tissue engineering, to artificially reconstruct human tissue which has been previously damaged. Mesenchymal stem cells have the capacity to become any type of fully developed cell, which can contribute to replacing muscle tissues or internal organs. To help discover the therapeutic uses of these stem cells they are grown in laboratories or by using medication to stimulate new cell growth within the human body. In MSC therapy the cells are extracted from the adult patient’s bone marrow via a procedure called bone marrow aspiration. This usually involves inserting a needle into the back of the patients hip bone and removing the sample from there. These cells are then grown under controlled in vitro conditions in a lab, so that they can multiply and same time mature( also referred to as differentiated. This process may take two to three weeks. The kind of mature, fully differentiated cell phenotype and the number of those cells created though this can be influenced in three ways. Firstly by varying the initial seed density in the culture medium, secondly through changing the conditions of the medium during expansion, and lastly through the addition of additives such as proteins or growth hormones to the culture medium. They are then harvested and put back into the patient through local delivery or systemic infusion.

MSCs possess many properties that are ideal for the treatment of inflammatory and degenerative diseases. They can differentiate into many cell types including bone, fat, and muscle which allow them to treat a large range of disorders. They possess natural abilities to detect changes in their environment, such as inflammation. They can then induce the release of bioactive agents and the formation of progenitor cells in response to these changes. MSCs have also been shown to travel to sites of inflammation far from the injection site.

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Wikipedia