Helping the heart help itself
Human trials of stem cell therapy for post-heart attack patients have raised as many questions as they have answered — because while the patients have tended to show some improvement in heart function, the stem cells do not appear to turn into heart cells or even survive. But in a featured paper published in the latest edition of the journal Cell Stem Cell, Harvard Stem Cell Institute (HSCI) researchers at Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) provide a solution to the puzzle — and what appears to be a new use for stem cells. The stem cells being transfused into the patients may not be developing into new heart muscle, but they still appear to be beneficial. Some stem cells in the bone marrow, called c-kit+ cells, appear capable of stimulating adult stem cells already present in the heart to repair the damaged tissue. What this means, in effect, is that the c-kit+ stem...