The stem cells of researcher Dhruv Sareen are now orbiting the Earth. The mission? To test if they will grow better in zero gravity.
Scientists at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles are trying to find new ways to produce large batches of a stem cell type that can generate almost any other cell type in the body, and potentially be used to make treatments for many diseases. The cells arrived at the International Space Station over the weekend in a supply ship.
“I don’t think I can afford what it costs now” to take a private trip into space, Sareen said. “At least a part of me in the cells can go up!”
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The experiment is the latest research project to shoot stem cells into space. Some, like this one, seek to overcome the terrestrial difficulty of mass-producing cells. Others explore how space travel affects the body’s cells. And some help to better understand diseases like cancer.
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“By pushing boundaries like this, it’s knowledge and science and learning,” said Clive Svendsen, executive director of the Cedars-Sinai Institute for Regenerative Medicine.
Six previous projects in the United States, China, and Italy sent several types of stem cells, including his team’s study of the effects of microgravity on cardiac function at the cellular level, said Dr. Joseph Wu of Stanford University, which runs the Stanford Cardiovascular Institute. Wu helped coordinate a series of space-based stem cell research programs last year.
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The terrestrial applications of much of this research may be a bit far-fetched.
At this point, the only stem cell-based products approved by the Food and Drug Administration contain umbilical cord blood-forming stem cells for patients with blood disorders such as certain cases of lymphoma. There are no approved therapies that use the type of stem cells that are sent into space or others derived from them, said Jeffrey Millman, a biomedical engineering expert at the University of Washington in St. Louis.
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But ongoing clinical trials with stem cells target conditions such as macular degeneration, Parkinson’s disease, and heart attack damage. And Millman is involved in research that could lead to a new approach to treating type 1 diabetes.
Scientists see great promise in stem cells.
This promise is tempered by a frustrating earthly problem: the gravity of the planet makes it difficult to grow the large amounts of cells needed for future therapies that may require more than a billion per patient.
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“With current technology at the moment, even if the FDA instantly approved any of these therapies, we don’t have the capacity to manufacture” what is needed, Millman said.
The question? In large bioreactors, cells must be shaken vigorously or clustered or fall to the bottom of the tank, Millman said. Stress can cause the death of most cells.
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“At zero G, there is no force on the cells, so they can grow differently,” Svendsen said.
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The Cedars-Sinai team has sent what are called induced pluripotent stem cells. Many scientists consider them the perfect starting materials for all kinds of custom cell-based treatments. They carry a patient’s own DNA, and their versatility makes them similar to embryonic stem cells, only they are reprogrammed from the skin or blood cells of adults.
For his experiment, which is funded by NASA, a shoe-sized container contains bags full of cell spheres and all the pumps and solutions needed to keep them alive for four weeks. The load will also include neuronal stem cells from Svendsen. The scientists used stem cells derived from their own white blood cells because it was easy for them to give their consent.
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They will run the experiment remotely with a box of cells on Earth to compare them. They will recover the space experiment in about five weeks, when they return to the same SpaceX capsule.
The work is designed to pave the way for more NASA-funded research. If they are able to figure out how to make billions of cells in orbit, Svendsen said, “the impact could be huge.”
During the same charge launch, researchers at the University of California, San Diego, sent blood stem cells to the space station, a repeat of an experiment they did last year. They want to find out if low Earth orbit induces faster cell aging, leading to problems that lay the groundwork for precancerous changes. One of the goals is to protect the health of astronauts.
Afshin Beheshti, a researcher at NASA’s Ames Research Center, said scientists are just beginning to understand some of the risks of space travel.
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“There are more unknowns in space than are known,” he said. “Any new type of experiment will shed light on how the body responds to the space environment.”
Ultimately, Beheshti said, research should produce more than practical, earthly solutions like new medicines. It will also help with distant human aspirations, such as living on other planets.
© 2022 The Associated Press