Parkinson’s Disease is a progressive, degenerative disorder of the brain. Symptoms include tremors, stiffness or rigidity, and slowness of movement. Approximately 1 percent of people over the age of 60 have the condition. There is no cure, so treatment will normally focus on managing symptoms, typically with medication.

Loss of the sense of smell is an often overlooked but remarkably a prevalent early symptom of Parkinson’s Disease. A complete loss of smell or a diminished sense of smell often precedes the usual motor symptoms of this neurodegenerative disease by several years, and has a prevalence of 90 percent in early-stage patients.

Researchers at the Michael J. Fox Foundation noted, “Early detection is a crucial step to understanding the causes of and developing better treatments for Parkinson’s Disease. Even before the typical tremor and slowness of movements occur in Parkinson’s Disease, it may be possible to detect early changes in the brain and symptoms that are associated with Parkinson’s Disease. For example, loss of sense of smell is a common but little noticed symptom that may occur years before the onset of motor symptoms or a Parkinson’s Disease diagnosis.”

The loss of sense of smell – whether as a result of aging, medication, illness or injury – affects sense of taste; when the sense of smell is intact, it combines with the sense of taste to communicate the flavor of food. Smell loss in people with Parkinson’s further reduces quality of life and compromises nutritional status.

New cutting-edge research conducted at Tufts University provided the first evidence that it is possible to regenerate stem cells of the nasal tissue in mice, a potential breakthrough giving Parkinson’s patients hope to restore their sense of smell.

Stem cells are undifferentiated, or unspecialized; they are highly potent and able to generate many different types of cells. Adult stem cells are responsible for maintaining the structure of the tissue in which they are found and repairing it after injury. There is evidence that adult stem cells may be able to regenerate in response to injury to tissue as part of a natural healing process.

Medical News Bulletin, June 2018

Excerpted from article by Aaron Kwong, MSc

Regenerative therapy is a cell-based technique using stem cells to boost tissue regeneration. Though many different stem cells are used, one of the most promising is fat-derived adipose stem cells. 

What is regenerative therapy?

Regenerative therapy is the reconstruction or rejuvenation of damaged tissue using stem-cell-based techniques. Stem cells are the cellular “seeds” of our body that allow our organs and tissues to regenerate.

Typically, when the cells in our body mature, a significant trade-off is made. Cells lose the ability to divide but they gain a specialized function. Muscle cells, for example, gain the specialization for contracting. If our bodies were completely made of specialized cells, any damage may be life-threatening since these cells cannot regenerate. To solve this, our bodies store a small amount of stem cells that are able to divide and later specialize to replace damaged cells. For example, muscle stem cells divide to repair and grow damaged muscle tissue.

Regenerative therapy uses stem cells to boost tissue recovery

Regenerative therapy takes advantage of the utility of stem cells by harvesting and reintroducing them to a patient to boost normal tissue recovery. This is especially critical for patients suffering from genetic degenerative diseases, whose stem cells are dysfunctional, and injuries that are too great to repair naturally. By injecting stem cells directly into the affected tissue, these cells will seed the patient with healthy stem cells which can repopulate the affected area with healthy tissue and curb the degenerative process.

Alternatively, harvested stem cells can be grown, which mimics normal tissue elasticity to promote the stem cells to divide, reorganize, and specialize into tissues which can be transplanted to the patients. A common application of this approach is regenerating skin grafts for burn-wound victims to help grow healthy skin during their recovery. Due to these advantages, regenerative therapy is a vital technique that can help treat and potentially cure many genetic diseases and physical ailments.

Adipose stem cells

When one thinks of fat, one of the last things they might think of is how many stem cells are in it. But researchers have found that adipose tissue is a plentiful source of adipose stem cells that can be easily harvested and be applied for regenerative therapy. In fact, 500x more stem cells can be harvested from fat than from bone marrow and with minimal harm.

Recent research on adipose (fat) stem cells found they have a high replication and growth factor secretion rate making them a viable choice for certain regenerative therapies. When researchers used adipose stem cells to treat spinal cord injuries in rats, they found it secreted more growth factors than bone marrow stem cells. These growth factors are critical for promoting regeneration in damaged tissue which was seen in higher rates of spinal cord injury recovery in adipose stem cell than in bone marrow stem cells.

Adipose stem cells were also found to have some success in treating Parry-Romberg syndrome, a hemi-facial degenerative disease, as well as Perineal Crohn’s disease, an inflammatory disease making them highly versatile for a diverse range of diseases.

Promising applications for fat-derived stem cells

Regenerative therapy is a cell-based clinical technique which uses stem cells to boost tissue regeneration. Though many different stem cells are used, one of the most promising is fat-derived adipose stem cells. These cells are relatively abundant and easy to collect within the human body. Combined with their ability to secrete key growth factors in vascularization, adipose stem cells are ideal for regenerative therapy in treating certain diseases and relatively successful in cosmetic surgeries. Though there is controversial evidence that they are associated with cardiac diseases and can be linked with cancer progression, adipose stem cell research will continue to uncover their potential for regenerative therapy.