HT chemical manipulation of foetal and adult stem cells - selection transfection and scaffold identification

我们将研究的细胞，即所谓的骨髓间充质干细胞，非常特殊，因为它们有潜力形成各种组织类型，如软骨，骨骼，肌肉，肌腱，韧带和脂肪。因此，干细胞目前是疾病治疗和修复医学中最令人兴奋和最有前途的领域之一，在未来，这将允许开发基于干细胞的疗法来治疗或治愈疾病。鉴于我们人口老龄化的事实，开发利用干细胞的策略以允许骨形成或替换或修复患病或磨损的骨是一个主要的临床和社会经济需求。然而，使这种方法成功的关键问题是开发允许纯化干细胞以提供足够的细胞用于组织再生的方法，以及开发允许控制细胞并将其转化为所需的特定细胞的工具。还需要允许构建3D支架以允许干细胞生长以形成选定的组织。这项研究计划提供了一个独特的机会，以确定选择的人口和人口子集，调节分化，并提供适当的支架三维骨骼重建和骨形成。

The cells we will study, so-called Mesenchymal stem cells from bone marrow, are very special as they have the potential to form a variety of tissue types such as cartilage, bone, muscle, tendon, ligament and fat. For this reason stem cells are currently one of the most exciting and promising areas for disease treatment and reparative medicine and in the future this will allow stem cell-based therapies to be developed to treat or cure diseases. Given the fact that we have an ageing population, the development of strategies to exploit stem cells to allow bone formation or the replacement or restoration of diseased or worn-out bone is a major clinical and socio-economic need. However crucial issues to allow this approach to be successful are the development of methods to allow the purification of stem cells to provide sufficient cells for tissue regeneration, and the development of tools to allow the cells to be controlled and converted into the specific cells desired. There is also a need to allow 3D scaffolds to be built to allow stem cell growth to form selected tissues. This programme of research offers a unique opportunity to identify select populations and population subsets, modulate differentiation and provide appropriate scaffolds for 3D skeletal reconstruction and bone formation.