New technique follows fates of stem cells
A team of researchers from the School of Medicine has created a novel way to image stem cells for transplantation therapies.
The inability to track stem cells after they have been implanted into the body has been a major stumbling block to advancing the medical use of the promising cells.
The problem is simple: How do you know whether the stem cells you have transplanted have actually gone where they were supposed to? If a scientist generates pancreatic cells to treat diabetes, for example, how can she be sure those cells end up in the pancreas?
Live imaging techniques to resolve this dilemma have been unsuccesful to date.
The new technique comes from the laboratories of Martin Pomper and Linzhao Cheng, both professors at the School of Medicine, and is published in Cell Research. It represents a collaborative effort between teams at the Institute for Cell Engineering and the radiology department.
The researchers used two imaging techniques to look at stem cells and how they respond to implantation.
The first is bioluminescent imaging, which uses a super-sensitive camera to measure light emitted in different colors from a specific chemical reaction. Cells can be engineered to express a specific bioluminescent protein that allows visual tracking.
The second is positron emission tomography (PET), which uses the decay of radioactive compounds to monitor the location of chemicals. If cells are treated with these radioactive compounds before injection, they can be traced throughout the body.
Both of these techniques are well-established for use in the medical and scientific communities, making it even easier to incorporate them into future clinical work with stem cells.
This study is known as a "proof-of-principle" study, in which the researchers prove that a concept is feasible and could be used in the future. It has not been tested in humans and is not at the point of clinical trials.
In this study, the researchers used embryonic stem cells to track the formation of teratomas, a conglomeration of many different cell types in a cluster of cells in mice.
The inability to track stem cells after they have been implanted into the body has been a major stumbling block to advancing the medical use of the promising cells.
The problem is simple: How do you know whether the stem cells you have transplanted have actually gone where they were supposed to? If a scientist generates pancreatic cells to treat diabetes, for example, how can she be sure those cells end up in the pancreas?
Live imaging techniques to resolve this dilemma have been unsuccesful to date.
The new technique comes from the laboratories of Martin Pomper and Linzhao Cheng, both professors at the School of Medicine, and is published in Cell Research. It represents a collaborative effort between teams at the Institute for Cell Engineering and the radiology department.
The researchers used two imaging techniques to look at stem cells and how they respond to implantation.
The first is bioluminescent imaging, which uses a super-sensitive camera to measure light emitted in different colors from a specific chemical reaction. Cells can be engineered to express a specific bioluminescent protein that allows visual tracking.
The second is positron emission tomography (PET), which uses the decay of radioactive compounds to monitor the location of chemicals. If cells are treated with these radioactive compounds before injection, they can be traced throughout the body.
Both of these techniques are well-established for use in the medical and scientific communities, making it even easier to incorporate them into future clinical work with stem cells.
This study is known as a "proof-of-principle" study, in which the researchers prove that a concept is feasible and could be used in the future. It has not been tested in humans and is not at the point of clinical trials.
In this study, the researchers used embryonic stem cells to track the formation of teratomas, a conglomeration of many different cell types in a cluster of cells in mice.
Be the first to comment on this story