Embryonic Cells to Specialized Cell Types – New Discovery Explaining the Process

For a long time the scientists have been fascinated by the way the embryonic stem cells and embryonic cells become specialized cells, such as kidney or liver cells. Apparently there has been a breakthrough in the field and the researchers gained some insight into how things work.

The Findings

According to the results of the studies, the stem cells create roads and pathways that will determine their specialization. This is an important step towards finding a cure for cell-based conditions, like liver disease and diabetes. Due to the new findings the specialists might be able to recreate the roads and pathways in order to produce given kinds of cells.

The Process

The developing cells constantly move around and they build a physical environment that works something like a city with roads and pathways. The embryonic cells get signals from other cells that determine the pathways and roads in order for the cells to become liver and pancreas cells, for example.

The Breakthrough

The researchers have found that they can isolate the roads of the stem cells by freezing them. These roads have been used in a different experiment which showed that the roads can be used on their own as well in order to develop different kinds of mature cells.

Present and Future

The results of the study have shown the scientists that the current method of using stem cells may not be the most effective one because the specialists don’t use these roads and pathways. In fact the medical specialists simply ignored the importance of the cellular matrix.

Gaining Information

In case you would like to gather more information about this study, you should be searching for DanStem. This opened back in 2011 and it focuses on early stem cell study. It consists of nine research groups activating in different countries of the world. The main goal of the research groups is to find a cure for cancer and diabetes.

As you can see, it’s not a bad idea to conserve the stem cells of a baby, but the cells on their own are almost useless. There is also need for the roads and pathways for the doctors to be able to “tell” the stem cells what kind of cells they should become. This is something that at the moment isn’t addressed at all, so we can say that this study truly gave a breakthrough to the world and hope to the patients.

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