• Question: How exactly do you extract the stem cells from the body and where? =)

    Asked by harrydacob to Sharon on 16 Mar 2011 in Categories: .
    • Photo: Sharon Sneddon

      Sharon Sneddon answered on 16 Mar 2011:

      Hi Harry,
      That depends on the type of stem cell. Some of them are easy to get, some are a bit trickier!!
      Bone marrow stem cells are collected from bone marrow extracted from the hip bone so all that involves is an injection, similarly, other types of stem cells can be extracted from directly from blood.

      Tissue-specific stem cells can be harvested from different tissues, for example liver, breast, intestine, testis at different time-points: from children tissues, adult tissues, tissues of elderly people and even post mortem. This is a bit trickier as scientists have to work out which ones are the stem cells. Many methods involve the elimination of unwanted cells, rather than direct stem cell isolation. This may be achieved, by looking for cell markers with corresponding antibodies to label the unwanted cells. These methods are often combined with those that stimulate growth of stem cells. The cells grow and divide, eventually covering the dish in which they are cultured.

      We can also take advantage of their special physical properties for example they may have a large nucleusto cytoplasmic ratio and we can then select the cells we want.
      Embryonic stem cells are isolated slightly differently, When patients come in for IVF treatment, sometimes there are eggs and embryos that can’t be used for their treatment and would be thrown away. If this happens, the patients are asked if they would consent to the eggs and embryos to be used for research.

      If they say yes to this, then I will give the eggs and embryos some chemicals and drugs to stimulate growth and cell division and put them in my incubator. In about 20% of them, they do start to grow and divide and if they reach 5 days old without arresting (dying) then I can take some very fine needles and under the microscope, remove the inner cells which are the embryonic stem cells. These cells are then put back in the incubator in a special fluid containing sugars and salts and other chemicals and hopefully they continue to grow.
      Hope that made sense!

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