Cell Therapy: Past, Present, and Future

AbstractPurpose of ReviewCellular therapy started in the early twentieth century with the development of blood transfusion and later bone marrow transplantation. This review describes the historical origins and major milestones in the field of cellular therapy. We discuss ethical concerns associated with certain cell sources and how they influenced therapy strategies. A focus of this article is on the use of stem cells to understand regenerative repair after kidney injury. In addition, we give an overview over past and current kidney-related cellular therapy trials.Recent FindingsThe number of kidney-related cellular therapy trials has been growing exponentially over the last 20  years. Main applications of kidney-related cellular therapy are in renal cancer and kidney transplant tolerance. The USA and China are the countries with the highest number of cellular therapy trials.SummaryCellular therapy, in combination with the recent advances in iPS cell generation and CRISPR-Cas 9, has a bright future. It has the potential to enable highly personalized therapy strategies to overcome problems associated with cancer therapy, transplant rejection, and organ regeneration.
Source: Current Transplantation Reports - Category: Transplant Surgery Source Type: research