“…This hypothetical possibility that HSCs are fully plastic and able to trans-dedifferentiate raised much hope that HSCs isolated from BM, mobilized peripheral blood (mPB), or cord blood (CB) could become a universal source of SCs for tissue/organ repair. This excitement was bolstered by several reports demonstrating the remarkable regenerative potential of HSCs in animal models, e.g., after heart infarct (Orlic et al, 2001), stroke (Hess et al, 2004), spinal cord injury (Corti et al, 2002), and liver damage (Petersen et al, 1999). However, despite such promise, the role of BM SCs in the repair of damaged organs has become controversial (Orkin and Zon, 2002;Wagers et al, 2002).…”