The most pluripotent of all stem cells, embryonic stem cells, are obtained from the inner mass of the early developing stages of an embryo (as shown in the figure below with a blastocyst). Stem cells obtained from this newly developed bundle of cells have the full potential to differentiate into absolutely anything in the human body. Many scientists believe that embryonic stem cell research could lead to therapies that have the potential to cure at least 120 million Americans. They believe that these cells have the potential to cure thousands of disorders and biomedical problems such as Parkinson’s Disease, Alzheimer’s Disease and spinal cord injury. Many tissue engineers also believe that stem cells can lead to artificial organ replacements, which would be a high priority on the market due to the shortage of organ donors in the United States. These are the types of cells that bring about the stem cell controversy because they are taken from a five to six day old embryo. President Bush has legalized approximately 60 genetically diverse stem cell lines that can legally be used in research laboratories in the United States. The constant struggle between science, the government, and religion is at the pinnacle of this controversy.

Dr. Shahin Rafii and his team from Howard Hughes Medical Institute have been fighting for ten years to eliminate the stem cell controversy by utilizing adult stem cells. Adult stem cells can be obtained from full-grown adults rather than newly conceived embryos, but not all of their cells are stem cells because the majority of them have already differentiated into specific tissue types. Therefore, stem cells have to be found in special parts of the body where they have been saved and undifferentiated, like in bone marrow or early stages of tissue development. These cells are not fully pluripotent and (so far) have only been able to differentiate into a limited number of tissues. However they have been used for various applications such as cloning, trying to cure diabetes, and artificial blood. Dr. Rafii and his team have successfully reprogrammed adult stem cells from male mice’s testes into functional blood vessels and contractile cardiac tissue, which can aid in organ regeneration studies. They utilized spermatogonial progenitor cells and reprogrammed them to form multipotent adult spermatogonial-derived stem cells. They hypothesize that further research will lead to similar results in human adult stem cells, eventually leading to treatments for Alzheimer’s Disease, stroke, diabetes, and cancer. This is the first time that researchers have been able to successfully isolate the small subset of pluripotent stem cells existing in adult testes. The world now awaits the results from human trials and hopes for successful reprogramming, which can eventually lead to several cures.

-Amy

Many new drug delivery devices are being developed to improve various disease treatments. A new micro device utilizing nano-engineered materials has been developed as an attempt to help sure cancer and HIV. This is an advanced drug-delivery system that works with micro-particles to make nearby tissues permeable to the drug. The uses of this device are endless, but just a few applications for this type of drug delivery can be to destroy kidney stones, tumors, and ulcers.

Dr. Shubhra Gangopadhyay from the University of Missouri in Columbia lead this effort. This device, called Mizzou’s Device, is about one cubic inch in size and will be in testing phase for about three years prior to being released to be pharmaceutically available to ensure thorough and adequate testing. Gangopadhyay and her team ensure that the nano-particles are not hazardous to the body and demonstrate no adverse affects in the mice tested. Nems/Mems Works, LLC plans to market the device and the nano-particles associated with it.

-Amy

Weird Science Wonders is a series of articles that I am starting to write about things that are different than my usual articles. These articles will not necessarily be about biomedical engineering, but about something in science that is anomalous in nature.

At Carl Hayden High School in Arizona, a marine biology teacher kept a pet shark in her classroom. The female shark, Twilight, had been alone in her tank for four years. On September 12 students saw a baby shark in the tank with her. Although the mother did not have any contact with other animals, she was somehow impregnated and gave birth to a young, Dawn (shown below).

This is the third known case worldwide of an unfertilized egg forming into a pup, the process is known as parthenogenesis. In this process, the mother’s gene divides in half and then, rather than combining with a male’s genes, it recombines with its own collection of genes to begin the process of a new pup. Scientists visit the high school on 3333 West Roosevelt St. constantly to analyze this new phenomenon.

-Amy

When preforming surgeries, an obstacle that has to be dealt with is making sure that the patient;s blood doesn’t coagulate (or thicken) when it comes into contact with metal intruments. This is currently dealt with by a drug called heparin, which thins the blood so that it doesn’t have an adverse reaction to the touch of an instrument. Heparin is widely used and is successful…most of the time. It creates negative reactions in three to ten per cent of all patients in which the blood will coagulate and clot up all around an instrument as soon as direct contact is made. The image below shows that when Heparin fails, coagulation occurs and the device used in surgery is covered with blood clots:

At Brigham Young University, BYU, an alternative solution has been found. Dr. Kenneth Solen and Jared Parker, biomedical engineers who have dedicated much time to this problem, believe that a different type of precaution needs to be taken. They suggested that rather than adding something to the blood that may induce an immune reaction, they would like to remove something. There exist specific proteins in the blood that carry a strong electrical charge in order to cause coagulation. One could conclude that to remove these proteins, something with a negative charge must be utilized. Therefore, the research team used a negatively-charged gel to attract and remove these coagulation proteins, while leaving the rest of the neutral and negatively-charged proteins in the blood. In the lab, this was proven to be successful, however human testing has not been conducted yet. Dr. Solen continues to pursue the perfection of this innovation at W.L. Gore.

After Dr. Solen’s anticoagulation method, the device used in surgery remains clear of blood clotting:

I would like to thank Blake Ferguson for sharing this article with me.

-Amy

I would like to apologize for being absent for so long and being extremely inconsistent with my posts. I want to thank all of my loyal readers for consistently visiting my site during this “dry spell” of articles. For all of my readers, I have a new look for my website, courtesy of Joey Dehnert at Blockbot Webdesign. I would also like to thank the wonderful folks at Single Grain for consistently optimizing my website to bring readers like you to AmyShah.com. I hope this new website is easier to navigate through and more appealing to the eye, if you have any complaints, suggestions, or comments about it, please contact me.

I have been away from my website conducting tissue engineering research in Dr. Steven George’s lab at UC Irvine. I am working with fibrin gels and three types of human cells to create a three-dimensional matrix and grow capillaries. My work has been stemming off the work from this publication in which the three-dimensional model that I am optimizing was designed. The three different types of cells that I am using are Normal Human Lung Fibroblasts (NHLF), Human Umbilical Vein Endothelial Cells (HUVEC), and Normal Human Bronchial Epithelial cells (NHBE). The capillaries sprout from HUVECs grown on beads in a fibrin gel with NHLFs. The NHBEs are only utilized when I am ready to compress the model to induce an asthma attack on the tissues. If you have any questions feel free to contact me. I hope you will enjoy the new and improved AmyShah.com. Thank you.

-Amy

The field of robotics has been of growing interest for many decades now, however the application of robotics to biomedical uses is a fairly new relationship. Previously, robots have been used to increase the success rate of surgeries, make medical procedures less invasive, and to aid in patient communication. In the medical field, doctors and patients all rely on robots to be accurate and precise everyday.

Now, there’s a new robot in town. This robotic arm is named Airic’s_arm and is made of 30 artificial muscles, several artificial bones that mock human structure, 32 pressure sensors and 6 length sensors. Meet Airic’s_arm:

Airic’s_arm possesses fine and gross motor skills which include writing and lifting a dumbbell. Its artificial fluidic muscles are filled with air to control muscle force and length. These muscles have previously been used in the field of robotics and are made from elastomer reinforced with aramide fibers. When the muscles are contracted, they don’t need anymore energy; hence, the arm could hold something up for an indefinite amount of time. This is achieved by 72 tiny proportional valves that work togther with all the sensors. Airic’s_arm’s artificial bones are extremely unique because they were designed on a computer and engineered in by original process. The bones were grown in a 3-D polyamide structure utilizing lasers to sinter the material.

Watch a video of Airic’s_arm in action, courtesy of the company that created this robot, Festo.

More Information on Airics_arm.

-Amy