Progeria is a rare but deadly disorder that is commonly known as an early aging disease, bringing forth conditions in children that are normally only reserved for older adults. To better study how to fight progeria, a disease that significantly affects the cardiovascular system, researchers at Duke University have developed a way to grow tiny blood vessels that behave very much like the blood vessels of patients with the disease. The miniature blood vessels, that only consist of smooth muscle cells, are connected to a microfluidic device that can change the environment that the vessels are in and to introduce different drugs or other therapies.
The researchers hope to soon be able to also use endothelial cells in their bioengineered vessels, helping to resemble the natural ones even closer. In the future they hope to be able to take tissue samples from individual patients and to build vessels derived from the sampled cells, which can then be used to test which therapies would be most appropriate.
Study in journal Scientific Reports: A Tissue Engineered Blood Vessel Model of Hutchinson-Gilford Progeria Syndrome Using Human iPSC-derived Smooth Muscle Cells…
Via: Duke University…