Diseased Cells to Stem Cells

A group of scientists now claim that, genetically diseased cells that are corrected through gene therapy can now be reprogrammed into stem cells, capable of forming all tissue in the body.

However, there are still many obstacles to hurdle before gene therapists can clinically use the technique. Despite this, the advance stands as proof that the simultaneous use of gene therapy and stem-cell technologies have the potential to allow doctors to correct most genetic diseases.

Up till this point, attempts to use gene therapy on stem cells have required therapists to harvest naturally occurring stem cells from patients and apply the gene therapy to them. However, such stem cells are rare, so their is very little material to work with.

'Limitless supplies'

To solve this, Juan Belmonte of the Salk Institute in La Jolla, California, and his colleagues in the US and Europe harvested fibroblast cells (cells that produce the extracellular matrix and collagen) from the skin of Fanconi anaemia patients (bone marrow disease), then used gene-therapy viruses to replace the defective genes with normal ones.

A second virus was then used to "reset" the cells to their embryonic condition. These induced pluripotent stem cells, or iPS cells, that can differentiate into any of the tissues of the body. Given the right stimuli, the iPS cells differentiated into disease-free progenitors of bone marrow stem cells.

iPS cells are prone to becoming cancerous, and are too dangerous for clinical use. However, the research team is attempting to find methods of overcoming this obstacle.

The technique should allow gene therapists to generate limitless supplies of genetically healthy stem cells derived from specific patients. With those cells, and a method transform them into whatever tissue is needed, new treatments could emerge for a wide variety of genetic diseases.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17214-diseased-cells-transformed-into-healthy-stem-cells.html
Postes by: Jonathan Sandeford s4202049 P10