Stem cell therapy is a promising treatment option for patients with cardiac, orthopedic, and neurological diseases. However, there is still a need to improve the therapeutic efficacy, especially for neural deficits, to prolong cell survival in the often harsh target environment, and to decrease the time, cost, and risk. Researchers of the School of Medicine of Stanford University, have been looking into new ways to improve stem cells' therapeutic effect. During the process, they developed a single‐cell encapsulation method via click‐chemistry and glycoengineering. This technique creates an efficient way to coat a layer of polymer around each neural progenitor cell (NPC).
To determine the optimal stiffness of the polymer coating for our single‐cell encapsulation technique, we evaluated dibenzocyclooctyne‐polyethyl glycol (DBCO‐PEG) chain coatings of various molecular weights (5, 10, 20, and 30 kDa) attached via click‐chemistry. By varying the molecular weight of the polymer attached to the NPCs, the stiffness of the immediate environment surrounding the cells could be altered, resulting in cellular control of differing capabilities and properties.
They have concluded that using the single-cell encapsulation technique can potentially improve direct cellular attachments by coating polymers on their neural progenitor cells (NPCs), which can effectively improve cellular/neural restoration.
Learn More Detailed Information: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/advs.201902573
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