Researchers create mini-kidneys vascularized from human stem cells
A study published in the journal Nature Materials describes how organoids, or mini-organs, which look like the human embryonic kidney during the third trimester of pregnancy, and it shows how these three-dimensional imitate fundamental aspects during the formation of the kidney, such as distribution, functionality, and specific organization of cells.
A study published in the journal Nature Materials describes how organoids, or mini-organs, which look like the human embryonic kidney during the third trimester of pregnancy, and it shows how these three-dimensional imitate fundamental aspects during the formation of the kidney, such as distribution, functionality, and specific organization of cells.
The research, led by IBEC researchers and which counted on the participation of researchers of the UB, Hospital Clinic de Barcelona, the Spanish National Research Council and Salk Institute for Biological Studies in the USA, allows creating fundamental knowledge on how this organ develops, and at the same time, it eases the design of experiments that focus on the screening of therapeutic compounds aimed at renal regeneration.
In order to carry this process out, researchers used pluripotent stem cells, with which they could recapitulate the embryonic development of the kidney -until the second trimester of pregnancy- and generated the mini-kidneys, including a vascular network, simulating the features of the embryonic microenvironment through the use of biomaterials.
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