stemcell tech

as a pediatric surgeon i meet babies all thetime who have had intestinal loss mainly from problems of prematurity. and when they losea significant amount of their intestine they can no longer eat enough to get enough nutritionto survive. and so tissue engineering is attempting to engineer that tissue that they've lost. we're at the workshop that cirm has convenedto look at the opportunities in tissue engineering and where engineering strategies might interfacewith stem cells and stem cell science. i think of tissue engineering as the replacementor regeneration of human organs and human tissues to restore normal function. cartilage for example is very useful applicationfor tissue engineering. if you can devise

a material that can allow cells to thriveand provide the mechanical support in that environment that's kinda that's tissue engineering. tissue engineering is not a new idea. we'vebeen able to replace skin for example for a long time using tissue engineering techniques.what is new however is the ability to actually put cells into those bits of tissue engineeredbiomaterials. a lot of the materials that are currentlyused by surgeons, if you need to have a hip implant or you need to have a blood vesselreplaced, they're based on materials like gore-tex or titanium alloys the same typesof things you might find in a golf bag. and so we're interested in trying to design new types of materials that will promote

stem cell growth and promote the body's healing process. this kind of meeting is so important to convene engineers and stem cell biologists and government officials and investors and other key stakeholdersto really understand what the challenges are. and think about the really big problems inthe field. what are sort of the things that keeping our research from moving forward andbeing able to move into patients. we want to ensure in the conversation thatwe're having here that the scientists are engaging with the patients in mind and helpcirm understand how we can help drive that science forward. one big roadblock right now is how do we actuallydeliver stem cells to a patient. when you

force the cells through a syringe needle thatcan be damaging to the cells. so one of the roadblocks that my group is trying to overcomeis design a gel like material that would encapsulate the cells and kinda provide a soft cushionfor them so that they can survive the injection process. with cirm funding we've made a lot of progress.and we've actually be able to work out in some mouse models exactly how to grow theengineered intestine. the hurdles are that we have to understand to science better andactually be able to make the transition to humans. there are a lot of wonderful ideas here andwe may be able to help some of these researchers move their product from an early experimentalstage into maybe even clinical trials. i think

with tissue engineering, regenerative medicinethere's actually now the hope that maybe we can cure some of these diseases.