Where are ADSCs obtained?
Compared to any other source, the vast
amounts of adipose tissue (depots of fat for storing energy) especially in the
abdominal region, by sheer volume of availability, ensure an abundance in
numbers of ADSCs ranging in the millions per unit volume. The sheer numbers
available also has the added advantage of not needing to be cultured in a
laboratory over days in order to get the desired number of ADSCs to achieve
what is called “therapeutic threshold” i.e. therapeutic benefit. In addition,
harvesting ADSCs from adipose tissue through simple, minimally invasive
liposuction under local anesthesia is relatively easier, painless and poses
minimal risk to the patient compared to all other possible methods. Vaser Liposelection yields a higher
number of stem cells than traditional Liposuction.
Clinically AT-ASCs have the advantage over
their bone marrow-derived counterparts, because of their abundance in numbers –
eliminating the need for culturing over days to obtain a therapeutically viable
number – and the ease of the harvest procedure itself – being less painful than
the harvest of bone marrow. This, in theory, means that an autologous (from the
same patient) transplant of adipose-derived ASCs will not only work in much the
same way as the successes shown using marrow-derived mesenchymal stem cell
transplant, but also be of minimal risk to the patient.
AT-ASCs, like
BM-ASCs, are called Mesenchymal ASCs because they are both of mesodermal
germ-origin. This means that AT-ASCs are able to differentiate into specialized
cells of mesodermal origin such as adipocytes (fat cells), fibroblasts,
myocytes (muscle cells), osteocytes (bone) and chondrocytes (cartilage).
AT-ASCs are also able to, given the right conditions of growth factors,
transdifferentiate into cells of germ-origin other than their own. Animal model
and human studies have shown AT-ASCs to undergo cardiomyogenic, endothelial (vascular),
pancreatic (endocrine), neurogenic, and hepatic trans-differentiation , while
also supporting haematopoesis (blood cells formation).