TSU scientists will develop implants based on stem cells

22 December 2017

TSU researchers and experts from scientific centers in Russia and Europe will develop implants based on stem cells that could become the new word in traumatology and orthopedics.

The purpose of the research, which is in the federal target program, is the creation of a suspension with the growth factors isolated from stromal stem cells. In the future such cellular products may be used to regenerate damaged tissues – bone, cartilage, nerve, liver tissue, and skin epithelium.

- Damage and bone defects are closed today with implants. As a rule, these are metal or ceramic structures, the implantation of which may be accompanied by rejection. The trend in regenerative orthopedics and traumatology is the creation of implants with a functional surface, – said Lyubov Pokrovskaya, the head of pharmaceutical projects of the Engineering Chemical Technology Center of TSU.

The developers plan to use stromal stem cells that can be converted into specialized cells, for example, into osteoblasts, the young cells of bone tissue, or myoblasts, which can transform into cells of muscle tissue, and so on. Three-dimensional substrates will be used for the cultivation of stem cells – scaffolds made of biodegradable materials that will gradually dissolve in the body.

In the first stage, the scientists will work with stem cells of animals, and in the second, with human stem cells isolated from adipose tissue culture. Four TSU scientific groups and scientists at Siberian State Medical University, Scientific Research Institute of Pharmacology and Regenerative Medicine, and Institute of Transfusion Medicine and Immunology of Heidelberg University (Germany) will be involved in the research.

- Scaffolds are made of hydroxyapatite created with synthesis technology developed by TSU chemists, and PLGA (polylactic-co-glycolic acid) with the desired properties. We plan to conduct cultivation and stem cells research at the sites of the project collaborators Belgorod State and Baltic Federal University, – explains Lyubov Pokrovskaya.