login
Become a member
Quick Registration
Full Registration Benefits -
Free Homepages for Doctors
Free Homepages for Hospitals
Free Homepages for Medical Conference
Free Homepages for NGO's
Personal Health Record Creation
Access to all Medical Slides
Access to all Jobs & Products Sale
Embryonic Stem Cells can be Harnessed to Grow New Skin
The laboratory achievement has been tested on mice and not yet on human volunteers, but the researchers believe it could be a boon for surgeons striving to save patients awaiting skin grafts.
For more than two decades, the main way to help burns patients has been to take some of their skin cells, called keratinocytes, and grow them in a lab in order to replace the damaged area.
But this process takes around three weeks, and dehydration and infection for the patient can be fatal.
Two other interim possibilities to cover the wounds are "decellularised" skin from cadavers, but this source is rare, and biosynthetic substitutes that include bovine collagen. Both carry the risk of rejection by the patient's immune system.
The new technique, reported in The Lancet, draws on the power of stem cells from human embryos -- the highly potent, but also controversial, master cells that grow into the body's various tissues.
In the experiments, a team led by Christine Baldeschi of France's Institute for Stem Cell Therapy and Exploration of Monogenic Diseases seeded embryonic stem cells onto so-called feeder cells.
For the next 40 days, the tandem cells were cultured in a cocktail of drugs to make them grow, and then attached to an artificial matrix replicating the structure of skin.
|
|
|
More News on: Stem Cells - Cord Blood, Stem Cells - Fundamentals, Parkinsons Disease Surgical Treatment, Genetics and Stem Cells, Pityriasis rosea, Pemphigus, Hives, Scleroderma, Bone Marrow Transplantation, Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine
 Comment & Contribute
|
Medwonders Health Network
- Health News Index
 | Quiz on Skin How much do you know about the human skin? Please take this quiz and find out. 
|
- News Quick Links
| News Categories: |
| » | Gasoigne Swaps Booze for Botox |
| » | Michelle Obama: Name of Olive Tree in Italy |
| » | Beyonce: Most Beautiful Women in the World |
| » | Robin Gibb Recovers from Coma Wakes Up to Cancer |
| » | Botox and Vitamin Jabs Maintain Simon Cowell’s Young Looks |
| More Celebrity News | |
|
