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Protocols for Adult Stem Cells
Introduction
Although embryonic stem cells currently enjoy the public limelight and show great promise for cell based medical therapies, it is the adult stem cells which are responsible for the body’s natural ability to fight disease, heal and recover, or fail and succumb to various maladies. The study of mammalian adult stem cells has surged recently, most likely from a maturation of stem cell studies in the classical developmental model organisms and in hematopoiesis.
Research and Techniques
All the tissues of the body examined so far are generated and regenerated from stem cells, it has been an important first step to adapt or devise new methods to identify and obtain these cells in quantity and purity for further study. Culture techniques have been optimized for managing the growth and differentiation of stem cells in vitro; as some stem cells are pluripotent, often the method is to guide the fate of such cells among the possible differentiation fates.
Understanding the Stem Cell Environment
Much of this work, and that in the classical model organisms, has helped define the aspects of the stem cell environment or niche that are crucial for both growth and differentiation, and these studies have moved in vivo at increasingly higher resolution. Importantly, the in vivo niche is a current target for bioengineering the matrix and signaling factors.
Types of Mammalian Stem Cells
Herein, we present methods for studying six types of mammalian stem cells, namely, neural, mesenchymal, endothelial, dendritic, and muscle.
