Fat-forming cells found important for muscle repair

The body contains many different highly specialized cells that all have their own function in the various organs we have. Constant renewal is necessary to keep tissues healthy: so-called progenitor cells help replenish tissues and organs by replicating themselves and forming new highly specialized cells, depending on the context they find themselves in. For example, we have progenitor cells that help form fat cells. Despite the fact that most people do not require additional formation of fat, scientists have discovered that such progenitor cells can also help restoring damaged muscles.

Highly experimental stem cell therapy underway

Stem cell therapies are as controversial as they are experimental. So far, it has been proven difficult to develop treatments that are beneficial for a patients' health, although improvements have been made with the use of stem cells to repair blood vessels, liver tissue and visual impairment, for example. It will take a while before such therapies become a commodity. In Italy, a new stem cell treatment has been given the green light, and is aimed at treating terminally ill children. The sole reason for the approval is the high unmet clinical need, as this novel treatment has no proven track record.

Oxidative stress turns helpful proteins into killers

Oxygen is one of the most important compounds needed in order to facilitate life. It helps us to burn our fuel and turn it into energy that we use for all our bodily functions. There are also forms of oxygen that are a little less beneficial. Some chemical variants of oxygen are not entirely stable and readily react with anything they encounter. We call this reactive oxygen species (ROS) and this forms the center component to oxidative stress. While ROS are used by the immune system to kill invading microbes, oxidative stress can also damage our body. Researchers have now found a mechanism by which oxidative stress kills cells, providing new insights into novel therapeutic options for a wide range of diseases.

Stem cells shown to repair liver after transplantation

Theoretically, stem cells should be able to regenerate all damaged tissues in our body. Basically every organ has its own mature stem cells that are able to produce new cells when needed, although some are more active than others. So far, we have seen limited success with the use of stem cells. A prime example was the generation of an artificial kidney based on stem cells, which was successfully transplanted. Now, scientists have shown capable of growing liver cells out of specific stem cells, and also transplanted them successfully, paving the way for a cure for liver disease.

Creating organs by printing stem cells

Because of a lack of donors it is highly necessary to find an alternative source of organs that can be used for transplantation. Recent studies have shown the success of using stem cells for lab-grown organs, but it is still troublesome to produce such tissues in high quantities. 3D-printing technologies appear to be the solution for this problem, as scientists have shown that such printers can be used for biological material as well. So far, however, stem cells could not be printed because they are too delicate and would die in the process. Researchers have now found a solution for this problem as well, paving the way for 3D-printed organs based on stem cells.

Injecting proteins and molecules in cells by squeezing

For many diseases the underlying mechanism or pathology can be explained by looking at the behaviour of cells. Because groups of cells form tissues, and tissues form organs and eventually us, effective treatment can in many cases be achieved by making cells healthy again. In order to achieve that, drugs need to find their way into the cell, but that is not always easy. Cells have shells, called membranes, that are very selective in letting molecules pass their borders. A novel technique developed by MIT may help increase the amount of molecules that can pass the cellular membrane. As it turns out, squeezing them does the trick.

Stem cell therapy to repair damaged blood vessels

Stem cells have the potential to specialize in all possible tissue types, and are therefore of great interest to scientists that wish to regenerate damaged tissues and organs. Several recent successes saw the development of therapies to repair heart damage by making use of stem cells, but we have also shown capable of creating bone, restore vision or repairing brain injury. There are various other examples of what we can do with stem cells, but most therapies are currently still in development. Another interesting new therapy is making use of stem cells to repair damaged blood vessels: scientists from the Texas Biomedical Research Institute have already shown to be capable of fully restoring a damaged artery.

Scientists device a new computational model of the cell

Our bodies, and those of other animals, consist of many cells that all interact with each other in order to acquire the necessary complexity that makes us who we are. This network of cells is incredibly sophisticated, but there is also a lot going on inside an individual cell. Perhaps the insides of a single cell are even more complex than all of them working together. Cells create proteins to perform various functions, and they do so by reading the information present on the genes on our DNA. In a new attempt to uncover the relationships between genes, their output and their associated hierarchy, scientists from the University of California in San Diego created a computer model that automatically gathers this information.

Making an old skin look young again

Companies spend a lot of time on convincing us to buy products that boost the skin. They make ludicrous claims about their product and its contents, while most of the skin care products that are on the market have yielded anything but scientifically valid evidence for their claims. Despite all that, scientists are performing research in order to find out how to keep the skin looking healthy. And it appears that some cosmetic products actually may have some therapeutic value, but perhaps not in the way that the companies that produce them originally thought.

Cells pull themselves apart during division

Cell division is needed to create multicellular forms of life, such as us human beings. Division creates 'daughter' cells that enable tissue renewal by replacing old and dying cells, and it is the driving force behind embryonic development. For example, human beings start as a single fertilized cell, but grow into a collection of billions of cells that all work together. We know a great deal about how cells split off from each other, but it remains a peculiar and interesting phenomenon. New research shows that cell division is similar to the rope-pulling game 'tug of war'.

Making stem cells out of urine

Stem cells are controversial, but the reason for their controversy is slowly being eliminated as science progresses. In the early days, stem cells were gathered from embryos, but nowadays, we can create them ourselves; we are capable of 'reverting' ordinary cells back to a stem cell status, after which they are capable of self-renewal and become any kind of tissue that exists in the body. It is possible to revert skin cells back to stem cells, but scientists have now found a way to make it even easier: kidney cells found in urine are suitable for being transformed to functional stem cells.

Nano structures aid in studying individual cells

A cell is the most basic form of life there is. Some organisms consist of just a single cell, but us human beings have billions of them. Because we consist of so many individual components, cells need to work closely together. They do so by forming a cooperation of multiple cells that all do the same thing. That is what we call tissue. Communication is very important, and cells normally receive signals from all sides. In the lab, things are a bit different. We use special culture flasks in which the cells attach to the bottom. However, this does not accurately mimic the situation in the body. Scientists from the University of Twente have designed nano structures to grow cells individually, in the shape of a pyramid.

Lab-grown kidney appears functional in animals

We are getting better in optimizing the compatibility of organs, and have thereby made transplantations feasible, but the lack of available donors is a huge problem. Attempts are being made to get people signed up for donor programs, but this is not enough to cover the gap. Novel attempts are being made to grow artificial organs in the lab. While it has been possible to grow tissues for quite some time, creating a fully-fledged organ suitable for transplantation has so far been impossible. Scientists from the UK and Italy have however succeeded in getting a functional lab-grown kidney transplanted in an animal.

Stem cell researchers awarded Nobel Prize

This year's Nobel Prize for medicine has been awarded. Last year, the prize was given to researchers in the field of immunology, who discovered the function of an important class of receptors used for the body's response against foreign invaders. For 2012, two scientists working on stem cells have to share the prize, and deservedly so. Their work pioneered the use of stem cells for medicinal purposes, and their work laid the foundation for artificial creation of stem cells, which means the ethically troublesome embryonic stem cells need not to be used anymore, and cloning, which also has important implications for medicine.

Biological 'internet' lets cells communicate

The internet basically consists of a bunch of computers that are connected with each other globally. By sending messages back and forth, we gain access to web pages and are able to communicate with other people through the web. This principle also exists in the body: cells communicate with each other using a variety of molecules, such as hormones, chemokines, cytokines. Everything takes place in an endlessly complex network, far beyond our own attempts with the internet. Scientists from the Stanford University Medical Center have found a way to send artificial messages to cells in the body, by harnessing the power of viruses. This way, they have created something that may be regarded as the biological internet, or Bi-Fi, as they have named it themselves.

Gravity helps scientists make use of stem cells

Stem cells are well-known as a promising therapeutic agent, because they have the capability to specialize in all possible cell types, allowing scientists to create a great variety of tissues. When the body fails to repair certain tissues by itself, such as those of the brain and heart, science may be able to lend a hand by use of stem cells. However, coaching these cells into becoming the right kind of tissue that does exactly what the scientists want, and make it ready for transplantation, is not that easy. Now, researchers from the Sbarro Health Research Organization have discovered that gravity plays an important role in stem cell behaviour, and reducing gravitational pressure may actually be helpful to improve stem cell therapy.

'Master molecule' to improve stem cell treatment

Stem cells are hallowed as a wonder drug that could potentially restore all bodily damage. Because these primitive cells have the capability to turn into any type of tissue, scientists have tried utilizing them to artificially create tissues that consequently can be transplanted into a patient. Despite these promises, delivering actual treatments has proven to be troublesome. Recent studies have shown some success with restoring heart tissue after a heart attack, but these treatments need to be optimized to let patients fully recover with the aid of stem cells. At the John Hopkins University, scientists discovered that one particular protein on its own may significantly improve creation of heart tissue from stem cells, promising more effective treatment of patients with damaged hearts.

Heart damage can be repaired with patient's own skin

While our body has several repair mechanisms, restoring lost organ function is usually not very easy. Organs such as the brain or the heart often do not recover after damage induced by a stroke or heart attack. When it comes to the heart, parts that do not receive any more oxygen and nutrients due to obstruction of coronary arteries die, leaving the patient with a partly dysfunctional heart. This reduces the pump function of the heart, which can, in severe cases, result in death. Because the body just removes the dead cells and fills holes with scar tissue, scientists are trying to regenerate the heart themselves. Stem cell therapy has been tried, but so far that remains problematic. Now, a study from Israeli researchers has shown how to repair damage by using a patient's own skin cells. It builds upon studies that have used a patient's own stem cells, which were found to be effective to restore heart damage. Isolating skin cells is much easier, meaning the Israeli therapy is of greater interest for clinical use.

The principles of cellular movement

Cells are the basic building blocks of life. They come in many different forms or shapes, and perform a wide variety of functions. During the embryonic stage of development, cells rearrange, move, multiply and die, showing that our body is not simply a static collection of individually arranged cells. Cells can move, and some types spend their whole life travelling through the body. Signalling mechanisms are necessary to direct cellular movement, and the same is necessary for tissue growth: cells need to know in which direction they should grow so that the tissue forms its correct shape. A collaboration of scientists from Lehigh University and the University of Miami elucidated a basic mechanism that makes cells move, thereby uncovering one of the foundations of 'organised life'.

Bones can be made from stem cells

Stem cells have been touted as tools to regenerate all possible tissues, therefore having an unlimited potential to cure disease. Though it is clear that making a solid treatment based on stem cells is harder than originally thought, scientists are slowly finding better ways to turn stem cells into tissues of choice, ready to be implanted in patients to take over the function of diseased tissue. Recent studies have shown stem cells can be used to treat brain injury, visual impairment, a failing heart, or a damaged spinal cord. There are many more studies being performed, and a recent one from The New York Stem Cell Foundation has shown it is possible to create bone from stem cells.