NEW YORK - scientists believe they discovered stem cells in the lung that can make a wide variety of tissues of the organ, a finding that could open new doors for the treatment of emphysema and other diseases.
When these human cells were injected into mice, they showed their versatility by rebuilding airways, air bags and the blood vessels within two weeks. An expert called as "amazing".
While stem cells have been found in the bone marrow and other parts of the body, it was not clear whether such a versatile cell existed in the lungs.
Experts not involved in the study stressed that the work must be confirmed by other research and that it is too early to make promises on therapies. But they said that this could be a significant advance in a difficult area of research.
"These are remarkable results and they have extraordinary implications, said Dr. Alan Fine, Boston University, who called the amazing results mouse." But it must be replicated. ?
Stem cells can produce a wide variety of specialized cell types. Scientists are trying to exploit as repair kits to repair the damage caused by diseases such as Parkinson's disease and diabetes. Most people have heard speak of embryonic stem cells, which caused controversy because embryos must be destroyed to recover.
However, the new cell of lung would be an "adult" stem cell, as others have found in the body. Adult stem cells maintain and repair the tissues where they are found. Bone marrow cells, for example, give rise to different types of blood cells, and have been used for years of transplants to treat leukemia and other blood diseases.
The work of lung is reported in issue of the New England Journal of Medicine Thursday by the Drs Piero Anversa and Joseph Loscalzo and his colleagues Brigham and women's Hospital in Boston. In a telephone interview, Anversa said that it is not clear of what lung stem cells normally done but he thinks that he is involved in the replacement of other lung cells lost life.
Loscalzo said that it is too early to say what lung diseases could be treated one day cells. He said at the outset, researchers are studying high blood pressure in the arteries of the lungs, called pulmonary hypertension and emphysema. Emphysema is a progressive disease that destroys the key parts of the lung, leaving of large cavities that interfere with the function of the lung.
Anversa said that cells can also be useful to accumulate the lungs after surgery for lung cancer. It is not clear if they could be used in the treatment of asthma, said he.
Although theoretically the strain lung cell could be used to cultivate a lung in a laboratory for transplantation, Loscalzo said it would be very difficult because the lung is so complex. Instead, he said, scientists will be first examine isolate cells from a patient, their multiplication in the laboratory and then by injecting their return into the lungs of the patient.
The mouse experiments showed "cells are more intelligent that we are", able to build structures of normal lung in an injured lung, he said.
The researchers found cell samples from surgical made a donation of adult tissues. The same cells appeared in tissue was donated by nine fetuses that died, give evidence that cells are present before birth and may participate in the development of the lung. To study the behavior of cells, researchers injured lungs of mice and then injected six doses of about 20 000 cells each.
In the 10 to 14 days, injected cells had formed airways, blood vessels and air bags. "We had a very large amount of regeneration" involving millions of new cells, Anversa said.
New tissues showed a "seamless" connection to the rest of the lung, and researchers believe that it would work, which has not been tested, said Loscalzo. The results appear in all 29 tested mice.
Dr. Brigitte Gomperts offshore Stem Cell Research Center at the University of California at Los Angeles, said scientific have been hotly debating whether a unique type of stem cells might give rise to more than 40 cell types in the cells of lung _ who are such different jobs to protect the body of inhaled germs and oxygen for carbon dioxide exchange of. It is technically difficult to investigate, said Gomperts, who was not involved in the work again.
If the new results can be confirmed, "this is a significant step forward" that will help understand normal and abnormal lung repair relief found in the disease, she said.
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