Swedish researchers say they are on the brink of being able to generate laboratory-produced brain cells for patients with Parkinson’s disease.
The project at Lund University is set to run in parallel with a renewed effort to test treatments of cells taken from aborted foetuses.
Doctors have been seeking to use transplants of neurons from foetuses for decades – but the ethical problems of using them have limited experimentation.
The Lund researchers say the new trials will be undertaken in Sweden and in Cambridge, UK.
And, within three years, they say they will be able to generate the cells from stem cells in the laboratory.
The aim is to implant cells which produce dopamine into the brains of patients with Parkinson’s disease, producing a natural supply and reducing dependence on medicine.
They have set out their plans in the journal Cell Stem Cell.
Researcher Malin Parmar said: "This study shows that we can now produce fully functioning dopamine neurons from stem cells. These cells have the same ability as the brain’s normal dopamine cells to not only reach but also to connect to their target area over longer distances.
"This has been our goal for some time, and the next step is to produce the same cells under the necessary regulations for human use.
"Our hope is that they are ready for clinical studies in about three years."
Human ESC-Derived Dopamine Neurons Show Similar Preclinical Efficacy and Potency to Fetal Neurons when Grafted in a Rat Model of Parkinson’s Disease. Cell Stem Cell 6 November 2014; Volume 15, Issue 5, p653–665
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