No abstract

Using corrected-Cr MELD, which would prioritize female patients for liver transplantation, may only be justified in predicting intermediate-term (9- and 12-month), but not short-term (3- and 6-month) mortality.

Spinal cord injury (SCI) is a devastating neurological condition and might even result in death. However, current treatments are not sufficient to repair such damage. Bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (BM-MSC) are ideal transplantable cells which have been shown to modulate the injury cascade of SCI mostly through paracrine effects. The present study investigates whether systemic administration of conditioned medium from MSCs (MSCcm) has the potential to be efficacious as an alternative to cell-based therapy for SCI. In neuron-glial cultures, MSC coculture effectively promoted neuronal connection and reduced oxygen glucose deprivation-induced cell damage. The protection was elicited even if neuron-glial culture was used to expose MSCcm, suggesting the effects possibly from released fractions of MSC. In vivo, intravenous administration of MSCcm to SCI rats significantly improved behavioral recovery from spinal cord injury, and there were increased densities of axons in the lesion site of MSCcm-treated rats compared to SCI rats. At early days postinjury, MSCcm treatment upregulated the protein levels of Olig 2 and HSP70 and also increased autophage-related proteins in the injured spinal cords. Together, these findings suggest that MSCcm treatment promotes spinal cord repair and functional recovery, possibly via activation of autophagy and enhancement of survival-related proteins.

Objective: To evaluate the efficacy of a novel decellularized porcine bone xenograft, produced by supercritical carbon dioxide extraction technology, on alveolar socket healing after tooth extraction compared to a commercially available deproteinized bovine bone (Bio-Oss ® ).Materials and methods: Nine dogs (about 18 months old and weighing between 20 kg and 30 kg) underwent extractions of lower second to fourth premolars, bilaterally. The dogs were randomly selected and allocated to the following groups: Group 1: control unfilled socket; Group 2: socket filled with decellularized porcine bone xenograft (ABCcolla ® ) and covered by a commercially available porcine collagen membrane (Bio-Gide ® ); Group 3: socket filled with Bio-Oss ® and covered by Bio-Gide ® membrane. One dogs from each group was sacrificed at 4-, 12-, and 24-week to evaluate the socket healing after tooth extraction. The mandible bone blocks were processed without decalcification and specimens were embedded in methyl methacrylate and subjected to histopathology analyses to evaluate the bone regeneration in the extraction sockets.Results: At 24-week after socket healing, ABCcolla ® treated defects demonstrated significantly higher histopathology score in new bone formation and bone bridging, but significantly lower score in fluorescent labeling than those of the Bio-Oss ® . In the microphotographic examination, decellularized porcine bone xenograft showed similar characteristics of new bone formation to that of Bio-Oss ® . However, there was significantly less remnant implant materials in the decellularized porcine bone xenograft compared to the Bio-Oss ® group at 24-week. Thus, the decellularized porcine bone graft seems to have promising bone regeneration properties similar to that of

After injury to the CNS, microglia are rapidly activated and concentrated and trigger inflammatory reaction at the sites of injury. Bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (BMMSC) represent attractive cell sources for treating CNS injury. Although anti-inflammatory and paracrine effects of grafted BMMSC have been shown, direct modulation of BMMSC on microglia in situ remains unclear. The present work employs in vitro transwell assay to characterize the effects of BMMSC on LPS-stimulated microglia. BMMSC are cultivated in serum and serum-free (sf) conditions, namely, BMMSC and BMMSC-sf. Both cultures express major surface markers specific for mesenchymal stem cells. However, the BMMSC-sf exhibit sphere-like structure with reduced expression of two adherent cell markers, CD29 and CD90. Compared to BMMSC-sf, BMMSC are fibroblast like and have faster differentiation potential into neural-like cells. Furthermore, BMMSC release significant levels of TIMP-1 and VEGF, regardless of being alone or in coculture. The downregulated MMP-9 mRNA may be caused by TIMP-1 secretion from BMMSC. Our cell culture system provides a powerful tool for investigating the molecular and cellular changes in microglia-BMMSC cocultures.