A toothy solution for stem cell harvesting

Subject: Science and Technology

Section: Biotechnology

Context:

The bone marrow has till now been the single most common source of stem cells.
However, other sources such as the umbilical cord or adipose tissue are being tapped too.

New Research regenerative, or stem cell therapy

Irrespective of the age of the donor, stem cells from gingival or gum tissue help regenerate neuronal cells [or nerve cells].
This finding could eventually help in the treatment of nerve-related disorders such as Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s.

Why gingiva?

It is very difficult to extract cells from the bone marrow. These would come from the knee cap of a donor who may not be healthy and is likely afflicted with arthritis or some such condition related to the bone.
The recovery time after extraction of bone marrow tissue is more compared with that for gingival tissue.
Extracting bone tissue is a highly invasive procedure.
Gingiva offers no such complication. Anyone can donate gingival tissue and the healing time is about 7-10 days.
With age, stem cells tend to develop tumours over time. This was not observed in the lab growth derived from gingival tissue.

Limitation

However, when the stem cells were induced to develop osteoblasts or bone cells, or adipose tissue, the ability declined with the increasing age of the donor.
Only in the regeneration of neuronal cells, stem cells derived from gingival tissue were uniformly effective, despite age differences.

Use of stem cells in regenerative therapy

Stem cells are the basic building blocks that help generate other cells — which could either be stem cells or other specialised cells for specific functions, such as blood cells, nerve cells, bone cells or heart muscle cells.
In the treatment of cancer, an infusion of stem cells from a donor or from oneself has shown promise.
Cancer is a disease that kills numerous cells in a short period of time. To negate the effect of cancer, stem cells perform the critical function of regenerating healthy cells to replace the damaged ones.
Stem cell therapy was first tried in 1958 by French oncologist Georges Mathé, who performed the first bone marrow graft to help save six Yugoslavian nuclear researchers who had been accidentally irradiated.
Stem cells are useful not just in cancer treatment but also in understanding how diseases occur and affect the body, and in testing new drugs, according to the Mayo Clinic website.
Stem cells can be derived from embryos, bone marrow, fat tissue or perinatal fluids such as umbilical cord blood.

Autologous stem cell therapy

It is the treatment using one’s own stem cell for age-related neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s would be ideal.
Here can avoid chances of rejection of cells or other complications

Allogeneic therapy

Covid-19 treatment

Interestingly, the team expanded the experiment to see if stem cell-induced regeneration can help reverse lung damage due to Covid-19 infection.
The team measured improvement in lung condition across eight parameters including presence of blood clots and fibroids, and the infiltration of immune cells into the lungs.