Title:Advent and Maturation of Regenerative Medicine
Volume: 7
Issue: 6
Author(s): Abner M. Mhashilkar and Anthony Atala
Affiliation:
Keywords:
Bone marrow, cord blood units, hematopoeitic stem cells, human embryonic stem cells, induced pluripotent stem
cells, mesenchymal stem cells, regenerative medicine, stem cell therapy, tissue engineering, umbilical cord blood
Abstract: The field of regenerative medicine (RM), encompassing stem cell (SC) technologies, therapeutics, tissue engineering
(TE), biomaterials, scaffolds and other enabling technologies provides a wide gamut of tools and tracks to combat,
manage and hopefully cure serious human and animal injuries, dysfunctions and diseases. This review illustrates the
trends that are becoming the major platforms in this field. The last 10 years in itself has seen major definitive observations,
including multi-track directives of adult stem cell translational technologies, tissue and organ engineering protocols,
iPS cell applications and understanding of the role of cancer stem cells to develop effective anti-cancer regimens. With the
rapid advances of RM translational research, further advances are expected to be implemented for personalized repair and
curative outcomes. RM future is bright although laden with challenges of global fragmentation which needs coherent consolidation,
stringent cost and time effective regulation and long-term funding mechanisms, so clinical and diagnostic solutions
are realized and recognized to combat unmet medical needs.
