Combining strategies to promote peripheral nerve regeneration.

PAULA A. SOTO; MARCELA B. FERNÁNDEZ VAN RAAP; PATRICIA SETTON-AVRUJ

Congreso; XXXVI SAN Annual Meeting; 2021

Peripheral traumatic injuries constitute a problem of public health with high prevalence worldwide.Current therapeutic approaches fail to restore the normal nerve functions, which is why thedevelopment of new therapies is of great importance.Adult stem cell therapies have provided encouraging outcomes in nerve regeneration. A majorobstacle is to secure enough cells at the injured site to warrant therapeutic effects. To tackle this issue,we proposed a strategy combining adipose derived mesenchymal stem cells (AdMSC) loaded withsuperparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticles (SPIONs) and their mobility enhanced by the applicationof an external magnetic field gradient (magnetic targeting, MT).The aim of the present work was to test whether magnetic targeting can help AdMSC-SPIONs reachspecific tissue and thus improve the regenerative ability of AdMSC upon sciatic nerve lesion.To this end, AdMSC, SPIONs, and SPIONs internalized by AdMSC were extensively characterized.AdMSC-SPIONs arrival and retention at the injured nerve were evaluated through microscopy andmagnetometry. Finally, cell transplantation effects on regeneration were assessed both in terms ofnerve morphology and nerve impulse conduction.AdMSC arrival to the injured nerve was significantly increased using MT and their beneficial effectssurpassed the regenerative properties of the stand-alone cell therapy. AdMSC-SPIONs group showedmany intact myelinated axons. Also, a very remarkable restoration in myelin basic proteinorganization, indicative of remyelination, was observed. This resulted in an improvement in nerveconduction values [1]In short, our results prove that magnetic targeting of AdMSC-SPIONS constitutes a novel andvaluable tool to promote nerve regeneration by enhancing AdMSC arrival at the lesion site, in theperipheral nerve system