Scientists Are Closer to Transplanting Stem Cells into the Human Brain

In a report just released by Goteborg University, scientists state that they are close to transplanting stem cells into human brains. The research shows that with stem cells are transplanted into the brains of laboratory mice, they are able to generate not only more nerve cells, but also nerve cells that are more mature as long as brain cells that are called astrocytes are not activated. These are the brain cells which are responsible for forming the blood-brain barrier, providing nutrients to the nervous tissue, and they also a major part in the repair and scarring process in the brain.

This is considered to be a very promising treatment for neurological disorders in the not too distant future.

Previous research has shown that reducing the activation of the astrocytes leads to long term healing of the brain damage, and that eventually there will be more regeneration of the nerve fibers and the synapses, which is the gap between two nerve cells. Decreasing the activation of the astrocytes has also shown to help yield improved results when the stem cells are transplanted to the retina of the eye.

The research was conducted using genetically modified mice whose astrocytes lack the ability to produce two different proteins called GFAP and vimentin. Astrocytes that do not have these proteins are not easily activated. The study showed that when neural stem cells are cultured with these modified astrocytes, the results are that the generation of nerve cells increased by 65% and the formation of new astrocytes was also increased by 124%.

The stem cells were transplanted into the area of the brain in the mice where new nerve cells develop, It is also the same area with nerve cells develop in humans.

When the stem cells were inserted in the brains of the mice who had the limited astrocyte activation, there was an increase in the number of nerve cells, an increase in the number of astrocytes and the nerve cells were also more mature. The mice that had the normal astrocyte activation did not produce these results.