Stem Cell Therapy may Help the Lungs Heal

Acute lung injury (ALI) is a major problem right now, and many people die from it every year, as many as 74,500 people die from it in the United States alone. ALI affects the epithelial cells of the lungs, which have a very long life span of a few years. This causes the the healing process to be very slow. The body is just not very will equipped to regenerate those cells. There is no drug treatment out right now for it that works. Researchers at the University of Illinois were studying this problem by working with mice. They found progenitor stem cells in the bone marrow of the mice called FLK-1 and CD34 that might help prevent and heal ALI. Flk-1 and CD34 are named for the proteins that are covering them. There is only a limited amount of them in the marrow, but scientists were able to grow more of them in the lab and insert more integrin proteins into their membranes, helping them "stick". The mice in the trial were given drugs that induced ALI and then were given the stem cells. They showed promising signs of recovery from the lung injury.

I found this article to be very interesting because stem cell therapy is very fascinating to me. There is so much possibility for new treatments in the field of stem cells, the future looks like it could be very fruitful in that field of study.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/10/091028162629.htm

Scott Eagleston

VTPP 434-502