Right now, regenerative medicine is attracting a lot of attention. What is this type of regenerative medicine? Regenerative medicine is a medical treatment used for the purpose of regenerating a part of the body or restoring function to particular components that has been lost due to an injury or accident. In other words, it aims to restore functions of organs and tissues inside the body.
Not very long ago, regenerative medicine was a subject matter of the future, something we could only dream of. Currently, there are medical treatments that are popularizing like skin transplantation. Regenerative medicine also includes rehabilitation and restoration of functions to artificial arms, artificial legs and artificial joints. However, the future of regenerative medicine is aimed to regenerate damaged internal organs and tissues by utilizing the function of stem cells.
Our focus is on stem cells which is gaining attention in regenerative medicine. Stem cells are cells that create the internal organs and tissues in the body. Stem cells are made up of two features. One, is the ability to divide and increase the same number of stem cells in the body which is called “self-multiplication”. The second function is that stem cells are able to divide into various cells which is called “self-differentiation”. Our company’s product “KINTARO Cells®” is a multipotent stem cell which has the ability to differentiate into various cells, and has self-proliferation and differentiation potential abilities.
Inside the human body adult stem cells exist (also known as somatic stem cells or tissue stem cells). The role of adult stem cells is to supply new cells and regenerate cells when cell death and tissue damage occur. Adult stem cells are found inside biological tissues where the cells are responding to the body’s current condition. Our company’s product “KINTARO Cells®” is an adult stem cell.
There are various types of adult stem cells. This includes: hematopoietic stem cells that make up blood, liver stem cells in the liver, neural stem cells that create nerves and skeletal muscle stem cells. Mesenchymal stem cells make up bones, cartilage, tendons, and fat. There are several types of mesenchymal cells which include adipose tissue derived mesenchymal stem cells and bone marrow derived mesenchymal stem cells. Although bone marrow derived mesenchymal stem cells are quite rare, they can be obtained by bone marrow aspiration using established cell culture techniques. Our company’s product “KINTARO Cells® are mesenchymal stem cells derived from bone marrow.