Sristi Raj Rai, Amity University Kolkata
The soft tissue that has the potential to produce a force that helps in voluntary/involuntary body movements is called muscle. The motion is a result of sliding movements of actin and myosin, the two protein filaments that help muscle contract. There are 3 types of muscles: skeletal (bone), cardiac (heart), and smooth (other organs). The muscular system is responsible for almost 40% of one’s body mass and it also can regenerate itself. The spontaneous muscle regeneration is contained to small scale, as in the case of volumetric muscle loss (VML), this power fails to work.
The current solution consists of surgical procedures in which grafts or autologous muscle flaps are introduced. Following this, physical therapies are a must. Even then there is no certainty that the grafts are not going to get rejected by the body in the future. Apart from this, one of the therapeutic measures that can be taken involves transplanting cells (satellite cells/muscle stem cells, mesenchymal stem cells, or myoblasts). This might regenerate the damaged muscles. But there lies a problem of invasive muscle biopsies, cell availability, the short lifespan of cells, transplantation at the injured site, desired differentiation, controlling the 3D structure and the microenvironment.
A group of researchers has successfully overcome the VML barrier by manufacturing a hybrid of natural (with high cell recognition and cell binding affinity) and synthetic (with better mechanical strength) scaffold. Thereafter, they engineered the same in a mouse model by direct cell reprogramming. The study has been recently reported in the journal – Advanced Materials. Reprogramming of fibroblasts into induced myogenic progenitor cells (iMPCs) was done, as they are cells of connective tissue that helps in the healing of the wound. The above conversion takes place only in presence of certain transcription factors. Parallelly, customized porous biocompatible polycaprolactone (PCL) fiber scaffolds were produced for muscle tissue engineering. The above artificial structure was filled with natural decellularized muscle extracellular matrix (MEM) hydrogel. Results showed fruitful muscle regeneration after the implantation and addition of the reprogrammed cells. Further studies are required in order to understand and know the minute details of this artificial system.
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SOURCE – medicine, S., 2021. Study finds bioengineered hybrid muscle fiber for regenerative medicine. The New Indian Express. Available at: https://www.edexlive.com/news/2021/feb/22/study-finds-bioengineered-hybrid-muscle-fiber-for-regenerative-medicine-18415.html
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