Stem Cells as Tools in Regenerative Therapy for Retinal Degeneration

Possible mechanisms of retinal function recovery with the use of cell therapy with bone marrow-derived stem cells

“…BM-derived SCs have been proposed as a potential source of cells for regenerative (8)(9) . This was based on the assumption…”

“…For adult SCs, the controversy between transdifferentiation and fusion has still to be solved (11,14) . Recently, it was reported that BMSCs are able to "transdifferentiate" or change commitment into cells that express early heart, skeletal muscle, neural, or liver cell markers (8)(9)11,(14)(15) . Similarly, SCs from the BM contributed to the regeneration of infracted myocardium.…”

“…In the eye, degeneration of neural cells in the retina is a hallmark of such widespread ocular diseases as age-related macular degeneration (AMD) and retinitis pigmentosa (RP). In these cases the loss of photoreceptors that occurs as a primary event (RP) or secondary to loss of RPE (AMD) leads to blindness (8)(9) . Bone marrow is an ideal tissue for studying stem cells because of its accessibility and because proliferative doseresponses of bone marrow-derived stem cells can be readily investigated.…”

“…Adult stem cells are present in most organs and tissues such as brain, bone marrow, blood vessels, skin, teeth, and heart. These stem cells are in the tissues that they are going to become, an area called the "stem cell niche" (8)(9)(10)(11)(12)(13)(14) . The inherent variety of stem cells has caused much debate on what constitutes a stem cell.…”

Stem-Cell Therapy for Retinal Diseases

“…Bone marrow-derived SCs have been proposed as a potential source of cells for regenerative medicine (Machalinska, 2009;Enzmann, 2009). This is based on the assumption that HSCs isolated from BM are plastic and are able to "transdifferentiate" into tissue-committed SCs for other organs (e. g., heart, liver or brain).…”