Wednesday, April 9, 2008

MIT: Stem cells from skin treat Parkinson's symptoms

MIT researchers report they have demonstrated for the first time that artificially created stem cells can be used to treat symptoms of Parkinson's disease in rats.

The work, reported yesterday in the online version of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, may lead to successful treatments for human patients of Parkinson's, according to the school. However, hurdles associated with reprogramming cells must first be cleared, according to the researchers.

Last year, U.S. and Japanese researchers reported they had reprogrammed normal human skin cells into behaving like embryonic stem cells, which can create almost any cell in the body. In December, a team from the Whitehead Institute of Biomedical Research found that the reprogrammed skin cells, known as induced pluripotent stem cells, could be used to treat mice with a human sickle-cell anemia disease trait.

The latest discovery involved members of the same Whitehead lab. They found that nerve cells derived from the reprogrammed human skin cells can be successfully integrated in animal brains and improve symptoms of a neurodegenerative condition similar to Parkinson's.

The research was supported by the Ellison Medical Foundation and the National Institutes of Health.