Stem Cells research in India

• Stem cells are special human cells that have the ability to develop into many different cell types (from muscle to brain). In some cases, they also have the ability to repair damaged tissues.
• Stem cells differ from other kinds of cells in the body.
  1. Self-renewal: They can divide and renew themselves for long periods.
  2. Unspecialised: It does not have any tissue-specific structure that allows it to perform specialized functions.
  3. Potency: Specialised cells can be derived from stem cells through a process called differentiation.

• They are divided into 2:
  1. Embryonic stem cells: come from unused embryos resulting from an in-vitro fertilisation. They are pluripotent meaning that they can turn into more than one type of cell.
  2. Adult stem cells: They are of 2 types:
     1. 1 comes from fully developed tissues like the brain, skin and bone marrow. There are only small numbers of stem cells in these tissues, and they are more likely to generate only certain types of cells. For example, a stem cell-derived from the liver will only generate liver cells.
     2. Other is induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSC): They are manipulated in a laboratory to be like pluripotent stem cells.
• Stem cells are applied especially to treat cancers, which require high-dose chemotherapy within the scope of medical care. The patient’s own stem cells are extracted from bone marrow or peripheral blood prior to high-dose chemotherapy, stored temporarily and transplanted after the treatment in order to minimize the side effects of the aggressive chemotherapy and to support the regeneration of destroyed cells.
• Besides cancer, Stem cell therapy offers great potential for the treatment of diseases such as neurodegenerative diseases, cardiac infarction, stroke, arthritis, or diabetes.
• Cord Blood Banking: Cord Blood is the blood from the baby that is left in the umbilical cord and placenta after birth. This is rich source of special cells known as Hematopoietic stem cells. These cells are derived from bone marrow, peripheral blood, or umbilical cord. They are used against cancers.

Japan approves growing human organs in animals for the 1st time through iPS cells (induced Pluripotent Cells)

• Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells (iPSC) are adult cells that have been genetically reprogrammed to an embryonic stem cell-like state by being forced to express genes and factors important for maintaining the defining properties of embryonic stem cells.
• The iPSC technology was pioneered by Shinya Yamanaka. He got a Nobel for this.
• Pluripotent stem cells hold promise in the field of regenerative medicine.

Stem Cell Transplant duplicating CCR5 Delta 32 Technique: Cures the HIV patient

• Under this, an infected person is treated with a stem cell transplant from donors carrying a genetic mutation that prevents the expression of an HIV receptor CCR5.
• CCR5 is the most commonly used receptor by HIV-1. HIV-1 virus cannot exist without normal CCR5 receptors. However, the specific mutation — CCR5 delta 32 — prevents the virus from using CCR5 as a receptor to enter host cells.
• This cures HIV patient. Only 2 people are cured Berlin patient (Timothy Ray Brown) and London patient.

Stem cell research in India by the Government

• Department of Health Research-Indian Council of Medical Research (DHR-ICMR) is supporting biomedical research and stem cell is one of the priority areas promoted through centres for advanced research/excellence, task force activities in identified thematic areas, viz. Basic stem cell biology, Cancer stem cell, Translational Research and Generation of induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSC), open-ended investigator-initiated ad-hoc projects and fellowships for past twenty years. Many laboratories have been strengthened through above programmes.
• Under Stem Cells & Regenerative Medicine, the Department of Biotechnology (DBT) has implemented projects on embryonic, adult and induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSC). Projects have been supported in the areas of the basic biology of stem cells; early and late translational research; development of gene editing technology for potential therapeutic applications; creation of animal models for various human diseases and training programmes on various components of stem cells and regenerative medicine. Studies have also been implemented to develop improved methods and techniques for isolating and culturing stem cells from different origin and also to generate induced pluripotent stem cells from various somatic/adult tissues.
• Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), through its constituent laboratories namely CSIR-Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology (CSIR-IGIB), New Delhi and CSIR-Indian Institute of Chemical Biology (CSIR-IICB), Kolkata has undertaken a Sickle Cell Anemia Mission during FY 2017-2020.
• The government has supported the ethical and scientific conduct of stem cell research through guidelines for stem cell research. These guidelines are available since 2007 and were revised in 2013 and again in 2017 based on the advancement in the field and released as National Guidelines for Stem Cell Research (NGSCR).