University of Iowa researchers say they’re making new progress in the fight to cure muscular dystrophy. Dr. Kevin Campbell, a professor of physiology, neurology and biophysics at the U-of-I, is part of an international team that used a type of stem cell to grow normal muscle tissue in M.D.-stricken mice. Working closely with a research team in Italy, they injected the stem cells into an artery and it went into the deteriorating muscle and replaced it with normal muscle cells that regenerated new muscle. Dr. Campbell says the study suggests a type of stem cell found in blood vessels may someday be able to regenerate wasting muscle in human M.D. patients. Campbell cautions more study must be done before researchers consider applying these findings to humans. Still, he says their results provide a possible new direction for efforts that have met largely with frustration in the past. While national and state laws exist that restrict the use of human- stem cells in medical experiments, Campbell says those laws were not a concern in his team’s experiments. The work was done with mouse tissue, not human stem cells. The report was published in the latest issue of the journal “Science.”
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