Pig neurons

Pig cell implantation helped with Parkinson's disease

Oleg Lischuk, N+1

The Australian-New Zealand company Living Cell Technologies (LCT), which is developing a technology for treating Parkinson's disease with pig cells, told New Scientist about the success of early clinical trials on four patients and the beginning of the next phase of research, the same is stated in the LCT press release.

Parkinson's disease is the second most common neurodegenerative disease (after Alzheimer's disease). It is manifested by progressive motor and neurological disorders that develop as a result of the death of dopaminergic neurons of the extrapyramidal system. Available medications can slow down the progression of symptoms, but not stop it; in addition, their effectiveness decreases over time. Therefore, various research teams are searching for alternative methods of treating the disease.

LCT has developed a technology that allows people to implant animal cells without the risk of rejection by the recipient's body. To do this, the cells are enclosed in capsules made of alginate, a material produced from algae that excludes contact of the human immune system with the implant, but is permeable to nutrients and signaling molecules. Previously, this technique was tested on patients with type 1 diabetes mellitus, in which the beta cells of the pancreas do not produce enough insulin. The tests had limited success: pig beta cells took root and began to produce the hormone, but over time its production decreased.

As part of the I/IIa phase of clinical trials (which primarily assesses the safety of the technology), four patients with Parkinson's disease were implanted with 40 alginate capsules with newborn pig cells in a shell (one of the structures of the extrapyramidal system), in one hemisphere of the brain. For transplantation, cells of the villous (choroid) vascular plexus of the brain were used, which produce a set of growth factors and other signaling molecules that ensure the vital activity of neurons. Each capsule with a diameter of about 0.5 millimeters contains about 1000 such cells.

The condition of patients before surgery and for 130 weeks after it was assessed according to the unified Parkinson's Disease Severity Scale (UPDRS). No additional drug therapy was performed.

It turned out that the experimental treatment not only did not cause complications, but also led to a marked improvement in all four participants, which persisted throughout the observation period. On average, the severity of symptoms decreased by 14 points on a 199-point scale.

Reduction of symptoms in participants of the I/IIa phase of the UPDRS trials
(graph from the Living Cell Technologies press release).

An employee of the University of Bristol, Steven Gill, who did not participate in the work, noted that the improvement was highly likely due to the placebo effect, since it was observed almost immediately after surgery. However, the effect of the treatment turned out to be persistent, which is not typical for placebo in Parkinson's disease.

Doubts should be resolved by the next phase of testing, which began in May 2017. It was attended by 18 patients, some of whom implanted 120 capsules with cells in both hemispheres of the brain, and the rest, included in the control group, performed surgery without implantation of capsules. The first test results should be received in November 2017.

According to LCT employees, if successful, the technology can be tested to help people with other neurodegenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer's, Huntington's and others.

Currently, many experimental treatments for Parkinson's disease are being developed. For example, Swedish scientists managed to reprogram astrocytes (auxiliary cells of the nervous system) into dopaminergic neurons using gene therapy. Another gene therapy drug developed by Voyager Therapeutics to restore the effectiveness of the drug treatment of Parkinsonism is currently undergoing clinical trials. There are also projects on the use of chimeric organisms to help patients with Parkinson's disease.

Portal "Eternal youth" http://vechnayamolodost.ru  13.06.2017