STEM CELLS FROM YOUR TEETH COULD REPAIR YOUR EYES

Stem cells from the dental pulp of wisdom teeth can be coaxed to turn into cells of the eye’s cornea.

Researchers say this could one day be used to repair corneal scarring due to infection or injury. This could also be new source of corneal transplant tissue made from the patient’s own cells.

Corneal blindness, which affects millions of people worldwide, is typically treated with transplants of donor corneas, says senior investigator James Funderburgh, professor of ophthalmology at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine.

“Shortages of donor corneas and rejection of donor tissue do occur, which can result in permanent vision loss,” Funderburgh says. “Our work is promising because using the patient’s own cells for treatment could help us avoid these problems.”

Experiments showed that stem cells of the dental pulp, obtained from routine human third molar, or wisdom tooth, could be turned into corneal stromal cells called keratocytes, which have the same embryonic origin.

The researchers injected the engineered keratocytes into the corneas of healthy mice, where they integrated without signs of rejection. They also used the cells to develop constructs of corneal stroma akin to natural tissue.

“Other research has shown that dental pulp stem cells can be used to make neural, bone, and other cells,” says lead author Fatima Syed-Picard, also of the university’s ophthalmology department. “They have great potential for use in regenerative therapies.”

In future work, the researchers will assess whether the technique can correct corneal scarring in an animal model.

The journal STEM CELLS Translational Medicine published the results.

The National Institutes of Health grants, Research to Prevent Blindness, and the Eye and Ear Foundation of Pittsburgh funded the work.

Source : http://goo.gl/ZGPtbq

Cell Therapy For Atrophic AMD Well Tolerated When Delivered Safely

MIAMI — Cell therapy with CNTO 2476, an adult stem cell treatment for atrophic age-related macular degeneration, is well tolerated when delivered safely into the subretinal space, a speaker told colleagues at Angiogenesis, Exudation, and Degeneration 2015.

Of the 35 subjects with bilateral geographic atrophy enrolled in the study, 33 received the cells via microcatheter.

“In this study, we need to do a better job with surgical delivery,” Allen C. Ho, MD, said, considering there was a 15% rate of retinal detachment with the method used. No patient had immune response, endophthalmitis, uveitis or tumor formation, however.

Ho gave early efficacy results on visual acuity accrued in the phase 1/2a clinical trial, but “with caution,” because the trial was small, unmasked and not controlled.

Mean visual acuity over 1 year in treated eyes improved four to five letters, whereas fellow eyes that were untreated lost approximately two letters, according to the presentation.

About 25% of treated eyes gained three lines of vision or more in best corrected visual acuity over 1 year, whereas no untreated eyes improved by that measure.

The strategy for therapy in this trial and in future trials of this cell line is to harvest adult umbilical tissue-derived cells without differentiation and to inject them subretinally to support or repair the diseased cells with cytokines or cell-to-cell interaction, according to the presentation.

“All the cells for this trial and the future trials will be derived from a single umbilical cord,” Ho said, with the cells being expanded according to good tissue practices, quality tested and cryopreserved into aliquots for delivery into the study subject’s eye.

A phase 2b randomized controlled trial is planned to begin in 2016, with an enrollment goal of 160 patients, Ho said – by Patricia Nale, ELS

Source by : http://goo.gl/e23o5u