The Potential of Stem Cells in the Treatment of Skeletal Muscle Injury and Disease

S Maclean,S Anand,M Snow,W S Khan,A A Malik

doi:10.1155/2012/282348

Abstract

Tissue engineering is a pioneering field with huge advances in recent times. These advances are not only in the understanding of how cells can be manipulated but also in potential clinical applications. Thus, tissue engineering, when applied to skeletal muscle cells, is an area of huge prospective benefit to patients with muscle disease/damage. This could include damage to muscle from trauma and include genetic abnormalities, for example, muscular dystrophies. Much of this research thus far has been focused on satellite cells, however, mesenchymal stem cells have more recently come to the fore. In particular, results of trials and further research into their use in heart failure, stress incontinence, and muscular dystrophies are eagerly awaited. Although no doubt, stem cells will have much to offer in the future, the results of further research still limit their use.

Highlights

Skeletal muscle is the most abundant tissue of the human body, it is highly dynamic and has the ability to regenerate
Despite the ability of muscle fibres to regenerate, muscle function is often compromised after injury due to the formation of dense fibrotic scar tissue. This may be induced by a rise in TGF-B1 and IGF-1, causing postnatal musclederived stem cells (MDSCs) and other myogenic cells to differentiate into myofibroblasts, producing type 1 collagen, the major component of fibrotic tissue [1,2,3,4,5]
Most advances have been made with bone, cartilage, tendon, and ligaments [81,82,83,84,85,86,87,88,89,90,91,92,93,94,95,96,97,98,99,100,101,102,103,104,105,106,107,108,109], this review shows that the application of stem cells in skeletal muscle regeneration following injury and disease is slowly emerging

Summary

Introduction

Skeletal muscle is the most abundant tissue of the human body, it is highly dynamic and has the ability to regenerate. Despite the ability of muscle fibres to regenerate, muscle function is often compromised after injury due to the formation of dense fibrotic scar tissue This may be induced by a rise in TGF-B1 and IGF-1, causing postnatal musclederived stem cells (MDSCs) and other myogenic cells to differentiate into myofibroblasts, producing type 1 collagen, the major component of fibrotic tissue [1,2,3,4,5]. Clinical application of skeletal muscle engineering in human subjects far has been limited, with clinical trials on humans concentrating on cardiac disease, stress incontinence of the bladder, and muscular dystrophies. This in part is due to the challenges of transferring ex vivo to in vivo tissue engineering. This review will focus on the potential of stem cells for skeletal muscle engineering; their sources, microenvironment, and clinical applicability

Anatomy

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Clinical Applications

Findings

Summary