Cambridge University develops brain cells from skin cells

The treatment of neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer or neurological disorders such as epilepsy are some of the challenges faced by many investigations that revolve around the study of brain function and human cerebral cortex, ie the nervous tissue covers the surface of the cerebral hemispheres. Understanding how they work and, above all, to develop treatments for diseases such as Alzheimer's is something that could be a little closer thanks to work carried out by a team from the University of Cambridge has been able to develop brain cells from cells skin.

¿Brain cells from skin cells? Specifically, the team of Dr. Rick Livesey of Gurdon Institute and Department of Biochemistry, University of Cambridge has developed cerebral cortex cells, ie those that constitute the brain's gray matter in order to recreate brain diseases such as Alzheimer in the laboratory and thus able to observe real-time development of diseases, test new drugs and study its evolution.

This approach gives us the opportunity to study brain development and human disease in ways that were unimaginable five years ago. [...] We are using this system to recreate Alzheimer's disease in the laboratory. This disease is the most common form of dementia in the world, affecting an estimated 800,000 people in the UK that affects the nerve cell type we created in the laboratory

Because of biopsies performed on patients in which samples were taken from their skin, scientists were able to "reprogram" skin cells to turn them into stem cells and, in turn, generate the cells of the cerebral cortex and take a first step in the generation of real, live model of a brain that can be used as a "demonstrator" that enables the development of future treatments.

An investigation with many possibilities.