title: Stem cell-based therapy for Huntington's disease.
abstract: Huntington's disease (HD) is a late-onset neurodegenerative disease characterized by a progressive loss of medium spiny neurons in the basal ganglia. The development of stem cell-based therapies for HD aims to replace lost neurons and/or to prevent cell death. This review will discuss pre-clinical studies which have utilized stem or progenitor cells for transplantation therapy using HD animal models. In several studies, neural stem and progenitor cells used as allotransplants and xenografts have been shown to be capable of surviving transplantation and differentiating into mature GABAergic neurons, resulting in behavioral improvements. Beneficial effects have also been reported for transplantation of stem cells derived from non-neural tissue, for example, mesenchymal- and adipose-derived stem cells, which have mainly been attributed to their secretion of growth and neurotrophic factors. Finally, we review studies using stem cells genetically engineered to over-express defined neurotrophic factors. While these studies prove the potential of stem cells for transplantation therapy in HD, it also becomes clear that technical and ethical issues regarding the availability of stem cells must be solved before human trials can be conducted.
authors.affiliation: Department of Pharmacology and Clinical Pharmacology, Centre for Brain Research, School of Medical Science, Faculty of Medical and Health Sciences, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand.
authors.forename: Christof
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Maucksch
authors.forename: Elena M
authors.initials: EM
authors.lastname: Vazey
authors.forename: Renee J
authors.initials: RJ
authors.lastname: Gordon
authors.forename: Bronwen
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Connor
mesh_terms: D000273:Adipose Tissue / Q000166:cytology / Q000378:metabolism; D000818:Animals; D001921:Brain / Q000378:metabolism / Q000473:pathology*; D019208:Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism; D002454:Cell Differentiation; D059330:GABAergic Neurons / Q000378:metabolism / Q000473:pathology; D006801:Humans; D006816:Huntington Disease / Q000473:pathology / Q000628:therapy*; D051379:Mice; D008822:Mice, Transgenic / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism; D058953:Neural Stem Cells / Q000166:cytology / Q000378:metabolism / Q000637:transplantation; D051381:Rats; D012091:Repetitive Sequences, Nucleic Acid; D033581:Stem Cell Transplantation
chemical_list: D019208:Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor; C579455:BDNF protein, human