Editing a gateway for cell therapy across the blood-brain barrier.

Brain

Institute for Regenerative Medicine, University of Zurich, 8952 Schlieren, Switzerland.

Published: March 2023

AI Article Synopsis

  • Stem cell therapy has shown promise in improving stroke outcomes in animal studies, but there is uncertainty about the best way to deliver these cells directly to the injured brain.
  • Local injections can effectively target the site but may harm nearby healthy tissue, while systemic injections are less invasive but often fail to reach the brain due to barriers.
  • Innovations like engineering cell surface proteins and using temporary barrier enhancement techniques could improve delivery, and safety-switch systems might help eliminate wayward cells in undesirable locations.

Article Abstract

Stem cell therapy has been shown to improve stroke outcomes in animal models and is currently advancing towards clinical practice. However, uncertainty remains regarding the optimal route for cell delivery to the injured brain. Local intracerebral injections are effective in precisely delivering cells into the stroke cavity but carry the risk of damaging adjacent healthy tissue. Systemic endovascular injections, meanwhile, are minimally invasive, but most injected cells do not cross CNS barriers and become mechanically trapped in peripheral organs. Although the blood-brain barrier and the blood-CSF barrier tightly limit the entrance of cells and molecules into the brain parenchyma, immune cells can cross these barriers especially under pathological conditions, such as stroke. Deciphering the cell surface signature and the molecular mechanisms underlying this pathophysiological process holds promise for improving the targeted delivery of systemic injected cells to the injured brain. In this review, we describe experimental approaches that have already been developed in which (i) cells are either engineered to express cell surface proteins mimicking infiltrating immune cells; or (ii) cell grafts are preconditioned with hypoxia or incubated with pharmacological agents or cytokines. Modified cell grafts can be complemented with strategies to temporarily increase the permeability of the blood-brain barrier. Although these approaches could significantly enhance homing of stem cells into the injured brain, cell entrapment in off-target organs remains a non-negligible risk. Recent developments in safety-switch systems, which enable the precise elimination of transplanted cells on the administration of a drug, represent a promising strategy for selectively removing stem cells stuck in untargeted organs. In sum, the techniques described in this review hold great potential to substantially improve efficacy and safety of future cell therapies in stroke and may be relevant to other brain diseases.

Download full-text PDF

Source
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9976985PMC
http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/brain/awac393DOI Listing

Publication Analysis

Top Keywords

blood-brain barrier
12
injured brain
12
cells
10
cell
9
cell therapy
8
injected cells
8
cells cross
8
immune cells
8
cell surface
8
cells injured
8

Similar Publications

Brain metastases (BM) are frequently found in cancer patients and, though their precise incidence is difficult to estimate, there is evidence for a correlation between BM and specific primary cancers, such as lung, breast, and skin (melanoma). Among all these, breast cancer is the most frequently diagnosed among women and, in this case, BM cause a critical reduction of the overall survival (OS), especially in triple negative breast cancer (TNBC) patients. The main challenge of BM treatment is the impermeable nature of the blood-brain barrier (BBB), which shields the central nervous systems (CNS) from chemotherapeutic drugs.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

The pathophysiological role of Aβ oligomers in the onset of Alzheimer's disease (AD) is heavily disputed, pivoting research toward investigating mixed oligomers composed of Aβ and Aβ, which is more abundant but less aggregation-prone. This study investigates Aβ:Aβ oligomers in different ratios, examining their adverse effects on endothelial cells, neurons, astroglia, and microglia, as well as in a human blood-brain barrier (BBB) model. Combining label-free Raman microscopy with complementary imaging techniques and biochemical assays, we show the prominent impact of Aβ on Aβ fibrillation, suggesting an inhibitory effect on aggregation.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Chemical composition, antimicrobial, and antioxidant properties of essential oils from asso. and caball. from Morocco: and evaluation.

Front Chem

December 2024

Laboratory of Spectroscopy, Molecular Modelling, Materials, Nanomaterial, Water and Environment, CERNE2D, Mohammed V University in Rabat, Faculty of Science, Rabat, Morocco.

Introduction: Morocco is home to a remarkable diversity of flora, including several species from the Artemisia genus. This study aims to thoroughly examine the chemical composition of essential oils derived from Artemisia species and assess their antibacterial and antioxidant properties through in vitro experiments and in silico simulations.

Methods: Samples of Artemisia herba-alba Asso.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is an irreversible brain disorder that led to memory loss and disrupts daily life. Earlier strategies to treat AD such as acetylcholinesterase inhibitor (AChEI) drugs are not showing effectiveness due to the inability to cross the blood-brain barrier. Moreover, traditional AChEI provides limited efficacy in terms of bioavailability and solubility for treating AD treatment.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: The lack of effective therapy for the treatment of Alzheimer's disease demands both the search for new drugs and the reconsideration of already known substances currently used in other areas of medicine. Drosophila melanogaster offers the potential to model features of Alzheimer's disease, study disease mechanisms, and conduct drug screening.

Objectives: The purpose of this work was to analyze the neuroprotective properties of the drug "carnicetine", which is an acetylated form of the natural low molecular weight compound L-carnitine.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Want AI Summaries of new PubMed Abstracts delivered to your In-box?

Enter search terms and have AI summaries delivered each week - change queries or unsubscribe any time!

A PHP Error was encountered

Severity: Notice

Message: fwrite(): Write of 34 bytes failed with errno=28 No space left on device

Filename: drivers/Session_files_driver.php

Line Number: 272

Backtrace:

A PHP Error was encountered

Severity: Warning

Message: session_write_close(): Failed to write session data using user defined save handler. (session.save_path: /var/lib/php/sessions)

Filename: Unknown

Line Number: 0

Backtrace: