Body Rebuilding: Researchers Regenerate Muscle Tissue in Mice

Source: Worcester Polytechnic Institute
Date: November 29, 2011

Summary:

A team of scientists from Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) and CellThera, a private company located in WPI's Life Sciences and Bioengineering Center, have regenerated functional muscle tissue in mice, opening the door for a new clinical therapy to treat people who suffer major muscle trauma. The team used a novel protocol to coax mature human muscle cells into a stem cell-like state and grew those reprogrammed cells on biopolymer microthreads. The threads were placed in a wound created by surgically removing a large section of leg muscle from a mouse. Over time, the threads and cells restored near-normal function to the muscle published in the current issue of the journal Tissue Engineering. Surprisingly, the microthreads, which were used simply as a scaffold to support the reprogrammed human cells, actually seemed to accelerate the regeneration process by recruiting progenitor mouse muscle cells, suggesting that they alone could become a therapeutic tool for treating major muscle trauma.

NEUROSURGEONS USE ADULT STEM CELLS TO GROW NECK VERTEBRAE

Source: University of California - Davis Health System
Date: September 6, 2011

Summary:

(SACRAMENTO, Calif.) — Neurosurgery researchers at UC Davis Health System have used a new, leading-edge stem cell therapy to promote the growth of bone tissue following the removal of cervical discs -- the cushions between the bones in the neck -- to relieve chronic, debilitating pain. The procedure used bone marrow-derived adult stem cells to promote the growth of the bone tissue essential for spinal fusion following surgery, as part of a nationwide, multicenter clinical trial of the therapy.

Doctors Use Patient’s Own Stem Cells to Grow Facial Bone in Groundbreaking Procedure

Source: Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center
Date: October 12, 2009

Summary:

In a first-of-its kind procedure, physicians have used stem cells taken from the fat tissue of a 14-year-old boy and combined them with growth protein and donor tissue to grow viable cheek bones in the teen. The new procedure dramatically improves the options surgeons have for repairing bone deficiencies caused by traumatic injuries – such as those from car accidents or soldiers wounded in battle – or by disease and genetic conditions, according to Jesse Taylor, MD, a surgeon and researcher in the Division of Craniofacial and Pediatric Plastic Surgery at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center. An estimated 7 million people in the United States have defects in bone continuity so severe that repair is difficult.