The latest development of the NIH: the standardized production of the clinical - level - type stem cells
"In the last vacation, I and my son decided to build a computer. Now, this is not a difficult task. Biologists can do this. Even we start to electronic store shopping, we bought the various components required. A few hours later, we have a working computer. It shows the power of standardized components, allowing complex functions to easily complete."
So if we're going to use scenarios in regenerative medicine,
Could it be so simple to repair tissue and grow human organs?
For years, scientists have been experimenting with stem cell breakthroughs, and of course these techniques have made some remarkable progress.
We know that the most important limitation in the application of stem cells is the lack of standardized processes for producing and manipulating stem cells.
It may be that the application of stem cells is difficult to achieve the same results in different laboratories.
And the latest development at the national institutes of health may be helping to solve such a problem.
Researchers have been able to produce stem cells in individual laboratories.
By collaborating with the renewable medical program fund, the NIH is now providing standardized stem cells for academic and commercial research or production.
This standardization has taken a big step forward and will undoubtedly lead to new clinical innovations.
Standardisation and well-represented stem cells maintain consistency and contribute to academic and clinical research.
There are currently two different types of stem cells available.
Clinical stage stem cells can be used for human clinical studies, while laboratory-level stem cells can be used to study the mechanisms of cell culture and animal models.
But only laboratory-level stem cells can be used to build conditions that enable stem cells to induce nerve cells, heart cells or pancreatic cells to repair those tissues.
To produce standardized cells, stem cells were isolated from human umbilical cord blood during normal childbirth.
These cells were placed in the laboratory and induced to return to more primitive cellular development.
In the early stages of these blood cells, they are pluripotent stem cells.
This means that they can be developed into any type of cell in the body through the right stimulation, thus giving them huge potential for medical applications.
Standardized stem cells are produced under GMP production, meaning that each batch of cells meets the quality and safety standards required for clinical use.
Another benefit of standardization is that it contributes to the FDA's approval process, which provides patients with life-saving treatments more quickly.
"The pathway to clinical grade stem cells eliminates significant barriers to the development of cell based therapies," said Dr. James Anderson, director of research at the NIH.
Stem cell therapy shows incredible potential.
In mice, stem cells have been produced to reverse diabetes, the insulin-producing cells in the spinal cord injury animal to recover the function of body, and they may be able to treat Parkinson's disease, alzheimer's disease and muscular dystrophy.
If we can produce these standardized stem cells, the future is feasible and expectant for more treatment.
Stem cell research many times to be included in the Science magazine of the world's top ten scientific progress, the United States, Japan and European governments are in the field such as the development of the related policy and huge investment: every year to stem cells in the field of fixed the NIH funding at more than $1 billion, and rise year by year, to $1.429 billion in 2015;
Through the "comprehensive strategy for science and technology innovation 2014", Japan has provided a long-term subsidy of 110 billion yen for the research on induced pluripotent stem cells in 10 years.
Stem cells have become a hot spot for enterprises and industries.
More than 700 companies around the world are working on stem cells and translational medicine. Competition is heating up.
Research data show that global stem cell size of the market in 2010 to about $21.5 billion, more than $2014 in 50 billion, is expected to 2020 stem cells in the world medical potential market size will be $174.5 billion.
In terms of market distribution, north and Western Europe are still the largest market for stem cells, accounting for 44% and 38% of the market respectively, and asia-pacific region ranks third, with about 17% market share.
