Important Breakthrough Paves the Way to Lab-Grown Skin

One of the problems major burn victims have is that, using the current protocols for artificial skin, they need to wait various weeks in order for it to be grown, using healthy skin from the own patient.  Scientists from the Tissue Engineering Research Group at the University of Granada (Spain), have, for the first time, grown artificial skin from stem cells of umbilical cord. The team’s work shows the ability of Wharton jelly mesenschymal stem cells to turn to oral-mucosa or skin-regeneration epithelia. To grow the artificial skin, the researchers have used, in addition this new type of epithelia covering, a biomaterial made of fibrin and agarose, which was previously designed and developed by the research team. This important breakthrough is expected to aid the immediate use of artificially-grown skin for major burn patients, since the skin could be stored in tissue banks and made available when needed.