WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Cells taken from human bone marrow, blood and umbilical cords grew into functioning blood vessels in mice with just the right coaxing, U.S. researchers reported on Saturday.

The so-called progenitor cells teamed up to form working blood vessels that connected to the circulatory systems of the mice, the team at Harvard Medical School and Children's Hospital Boston reported.

"What's really significant about our study is that we are using human cells that can be obtained from blood or bone marrow rather than removing and using fully developed blood vessels," said Harvard's Joyce Bischoff, who led the study.

Her team used immature cells, known as progenitor cells, grown under special lab conditions before being implanted into mice. Once implanted, the cell mixture grew and differentiated into a small ball of healthy blood vessels, they reported in the journal Circulation Research, published by the American Heart Association.

They used endothelial progenitor cells, which mature into cells that line the blood vessels, and mesenchymal progenitor cells, which differentiate into the cells that surround the lining and provide stability.

A mixture of cells from adult blood and bone or from umbilical cord blood worked the best, they said.

They hope to find a way to help the body replace blocked or damaged blood vessels, such as arteries blocked in a heart attack or stroke.

"What we are most interested in right now is speeding up the vascularization," Bischoff said in a statement. "We see very good and extensive vasculature in seven days and we'd like to see that in 24 or 48 hours. If you have an ischemic tissue, it's dying tissue, so the faster you can establish blood flow the better."

(Reporting by Maggie Fox)

 

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Bubble wrapped boy returns home

Jul 13, 2008 by Nathan Bevan, Wales On Sunday

HE looks like any other seven-year-old with a happy-go-lucky gap-toothed grin.

But Rhys Harris, from Newbridge, has a special reason for such a big smile.

He's back home in Wales safe and well after almost a year away battling a rare killer disease. Doctors had given him only 18 months to live.

"Honestly, it's like he's never been away," said proud dad Kevin, a former car salesman who uprooted the entire family to Newcastle last October to be near one of only two hospitals in the UK where his son could get the specialist care he needed.

"Rhys couldn't wait to get back and had been counting down the days on a little calendar, just like he always does just before Christmas."

In December 2006, Wales On Sunday broke the news the Hollybush Primary School pupil had been diagnosed as having Nemo, a terminal condition that affects only 35 people in the world, attacking the body's immune system. We revealed how, after he contracted TB, his parents Kevin and Dawn were given the agonising choice of watching their son slowly die or risk him having a bone marrow transplant and the chemotherapy killing him instead.

"The doctors told us that if Rhys continued with his regime of drugs then he only had six months to a year left to live and, as parents, we just couldn't accept that," said Kevin, 44.

In September, Rhys' family were told a bone marrow match had been found in the US. Agonisingly, this meant Rhys would have to live in a special isolation "bubble" to stave off risk of infection, Kevin and his wife Dawn being unable to so much as give him a kiss.

But he recovered so quickly from the life-threatening surgery he was discharged after two months. Since then, Rhys has defied the odds and been declared free of Nemo.

"It's amazing," said an emotional Kevin last night. "To think, the day before his transplant I'd considered not signing the consent form because I'd rather he came home to die with dignity and have his family around him.

"But deep down I knew we could never give up hope," he added.

"Now, clinically speaking, we're more or less out of the woods. But because Nemo is so rare and not enough is known about it, the doctors are hedging their bets and keeping him on a course of drugs."

So what's next then for little Rhys?

"A family holiday and then it's back to school in September - he's excited about seeing his class mates again," said Kevin, who added that he was forever indebted for the tireless support he and his family had received throughout their gruelling ordeal.

"We had everything, from people in the Valleys sending £5 cheques in the post to the Benevolent Fund of the RAF, in which I served for a number of years, paying our mortgage for a year, as well as our rent on the Newcastle flat.

"When things like that happen it really restores your faith in humanity, knowing that so many people care.

"Now Rhys is better I want to get involved in charity work myself, and maybe do some good for other families who weren't as lucky as us."

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