Stem cell fractionation using interactions with artificial matrices

最近，人们对干细胞的兴趣和潜在应用呈爆炸式增长。它们在治疗医学应用方面的潜力特别令人兴奋，具有生长替代组织和骨骼以克服各种疾病状况的真实的前景。干细胞在诊断中也有重要作用，并已在药物发现研究中显示出希望。迄今为止，干细胞开发的关键限制是它们的稀缺性。此外，即使当可以获得干细胞时，仍然存在从已分化成不可用类型的细胞中纯化和分选可用细胞的艰巨任务。目前，干细胞用标记物标记，然后使用非常昂贵的仪器一个接一个地分选。尽管现代细胞分选仪的速度非常高，但获得的相对较小的数量和标记试剂的添加意味着这些方法不适合于干细胞治疗的广泛应用。由于干细胞的稀有性，它们还没有在全球范围内得到应用。该项目提出将目前的干细胞分选方法从低通量的一个接一个的技术改变为能够同时分选数百万个细胞的非常高通量的替代方法。这一点的关键将是设计一系列的过滤器，作为智能筛。干细胞将被注入新的过滤器，该过滤器将通过细胞的形状，大小，灵活性和化学特征来识别细胞，而无需添加任何额外的试剂。一套过滤器将被组装起来;一个在另一个的顶部，以允许快速筛选包含有价值的干细胞和不太有用的细胞的混合物。这项研究计划将专注于这些过滤器阶段的设计，并使用尖端科学技术来产生一种全新的干细胞纯化方法。微流体、纳米技术、快速微结构原型等专业技术将与细胞生物化学和细胞生物识别的最新理念相结合，以实现更容易、更便宜、更快地收获有用干细胞的主要目标。对社会的好处将是巨大的，使干细胞治疗成为每个人的现实。

There has been a recent explosion in interest in and potential applications of stem cells. Their potential for therapeutic medical applications is particularly exciting, with the real prospect of growing replacement tissue and bone to overcome a wide variety of disease conditions. Stem cells also have an important role in diagnostics, and have already shown promise in drug discovery research. To date, the key limitation to the exploitation of stem cells has been their scarcity. Furthermore, even when it is possible to source stem cells, there is still the formidable task of purification and sorting of the usable cells from cells that have differentiated into unusable types. Presently, stem cells are labelled with markers and then sorted one-by-one using very expensive instruments. Despite the very high speed of modern cell sorters the relatively small numbers obtained and the addition of labelling reagents mean that these methods are not suitable for widespread application of stem cell therapy. Stem cells have yet to find global application, because of their rarity. This project proposes to change the current stem cell sorting methods from low throughput one-by-one techniques to very high throughput alternatives that will be capable of sorting millions of cells simultaneously. The key to this will be the design of a series of filters that behave as smart sieves. The stem cells will be poured through new filters that will recognise the cells by their shape, size, flexibility and their chemical signature, without the addition of any extra reagents. A set of filters will be assembled; one on top of the other, to allow rapid screening of a mixture that contains both the valuable wanted stem cells, alongside less useful cells. This research programme will focus on the design of these filter stages, and use cutting edge science and technology to generate a completely new approach to stem cell purification. Specialist techniques such as microfluidics, nanotechnology, rapid microstructure prototyping will be combined with the latest ideas in cell biochemistry and cell biorecognition to fulfil the primary objective of making it easier, cheaper and faster to harvest useful stem cells. The benefit to society will be huge, making the possibility of stem cell therapy a reality for everyone.