By: Arashdeep Grewal & Devangi Lamba
Have you ever wondered what Stem Cell and Regenerative Biology is? Maybe not, but now’s your chance to learn more about the topic and how it relates to Cardiology. This up and coming topic has the potential to revolutionize treatment and prevention of various illnesses.
As you may learn in grade 10 biology, stem cells are extremely unique and can be used in a variety of ways. They are special human cells that have the ability to change overtime into other advanced cells. They are usually found in fetuses and can sometimes be called embryonic cells. While writing this blog I was reminded of The Amazing Spider-Man and its mention of stem cells. As cool as that was, we are nowhere near the level of growing limbs...yet. At the moment, stem cells are used to treat and repair damaged tissue as well as produce some new tissue. In the future scientists hope to target some serious illnesses such as Alzheimers and paralysis.
In cardiology, stem cells are used to create Cardiovascular Progenitor Cells (CPC’s) which are building block heart cells found in fetuses. They have a unique ability to develop into multiple nuanced heart cells and thus are of great use to us. They’re grown in a dish and are engineered to produce a red tissue, below is a great video showing the red CPC cells and if you look closely you can identify a heart beat!
By studying renewing CPCs in mice, scientists are beginning to wonder whether the same can be done for humans. This would go a great length in repairing damaged hearts and treating health muscle diseases. If all of this sounds too good to be true, you would be right. The downside to CPC preparation in a lab is that the cells often do not mature into adult ones and go into “developmental arrest.” This is due to the obvious differences in environment between the body and a lab. This makes the manufacturing stage extremely hard. However, if we find a way to overcome this bump in the road we could be looking at a new way to create adult heart tissue. This discovery would create a new radical approach to treating heart diseases and learning more about them.
Case Study
In a 2012 study, scientists attempted to repair or treat damaged heart muscle with stem cells. These cells came from the patient’s bone marrow or a willing volunteer. Not to sound like a shady virus filled website, but the results will truly astound you! In the study of 31 patients the scientists recorded improvements in quality of life and found a decrease in heart tissue scarring. For some people it also improved the heart’s pumping ability. This was one of the first studies that used allogeneic cells. That is the name given to the cells that come from volunteers. This study shed light on the possible use of allogeneic cells which are much more efficient and cheap compared to bone marrow. While we do have a long way to go before it’s available on shelfs this study allowed us for the first time to truly see the benefits of stem cells and a possible future with them.
Regenerative Biology is meant to understand the difference between tissue that is regenerative and non-regenerative. Regenerative medicine applies the understanding to help in restoring tissue structure and function in nonrenerating, damaged tissues. Many of these tissues have cells known as reserve stem and progenitor cells that get activated when you get an injury, they renew the cells and restore the tissue at the same time. Every single regeneration cell has 2 main features. The first feature is that they are able to reenter the cell cycle if needed in the location of the injury, and the second one is that the activation is followed by the dissolution of an important regulator surrounding the cells known as extracellular matrix. There are 3 main approaches to regenerative medicine. The first one is transplanting cells into the damaged area, the second is in the biodegradable scaffold, bioartificial tissues being constructed by seeding cells, and last is stimulating regeneration in the form of regeneration competent-cell using drug delivery system or biomaterial scaffold.
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