I find it particularly moving when I read that a research was done in a place where I actually lived for quite a while. That’s what happened when I read a Scottish study that was led thanks to the collaboration of the Heriot-Watt University and the Roslin Cellab. If you remember the story of Dolly the Sheep, she was actually created in the Roslin Institute, just outside Edinburgh. That city stole my heart. Especially due to its green surroundings, which include Roslin, also well-known for its chapel, which comes up in the Da Vinci Code.
To get to the point of the study itself, some Scottish researchers have discovered a new 3D printing technique to produce embryonic stem cells (hESCs) that stay alive and maintain their capacity to differentiate into different types of cells.These 3D structures from hESCs will lead to the creation of accurate human tissue models that are fundamental for in vitro drug development and toxicity-testing. Furthermore, in the longer term they might be used to create viable 3D organs for medical implantation. The research has been published on 4th February 2013 in the journal Biofabrication.
Dr. Shu, co-author of the study, said: “This is the first time that hESCs have been printed”. While most of the laboratory grown cells grew in 2D, there have been previous researches that printed certain cell types in 3D. In any case, due to their high sensitivity, it hasn’t been possible to manipulate human stem cell cultures in this way before. These researchers used a valve-based printing technique that managed to preserve the delicate properties of hESCs, which were driven by pneumatic pressure and accurately controlled by the opening and closing of a microvalve. Shu explained: “The valve‐based printing is gentle enough to maintain high stem cell viability, accurate enough to produce spheroids of uniform size, and, most importantly, the printed hESCsmaintained their ability to be differentiated into any other cell type.”
This is a real breakthrough because so far animal cells have been used in the majority of the studies to test the different printing methods for the fabrication of 3D tissues and organs. But most of drug discoveries target human diseases, so it is more reasonable to use human tissues for the experiments, which would make the process of drug testing both faster and more effective. In the longer term the development of this technique might also lead to the creation of organs for transplant. Donations would be unnecessary and the problems of immune suppression and transplant rejection would be avoided because 3D organs would be created from a patient’s own cells.
Biomaterials and regenerative medicine are rapidly developing studies: in the future, they might succeed where medicine has not found solutions yet. The Chinese have already recognized their potential value and are largely investing in tissue engineering and biomaterials:this new Scottish achievement leads scientific research in these fields one step further.
Credits image: Flickr, Bikerock
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