Premature aging or overworked stem cells may be a major factor in chronic lung disease

Is the premature aging or overwork of stem cells an important factor in chronic lung disease? A study just published in the journal STEM CELLS Translational Medicine (SCTM) says that this is likely to be true

The study determined that repeated damage to the airway epithelial tissue would lead to the "biological aging" of airway stem cells

Epithelial tissue is spread all over the body

The biological aging of tracheobronchial tissue-specific stem cells (TSC) and their vegetative units pseudo-stratified airway epithelium.

Previous studies have also shown that in at least two chronic lung diseases, idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), the biological age of lung cells is greater than their actual age.

Biological aging is related to shortening of telomeres

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After the mice were exposed to naphthalene, an aromatic hydrocarbon commonly used in moth balls and moths, they used chromatin markers and flow cytometry to determine that the damage activated a subset of TSC, which continued to proliferate after the epithelium was repaired

When the researchers studied the reasons for this phenomenon, they discovered that a new set of TSCs were activated and were responsible for the regeneration of epithelial cells

Their analysis of mouse TSC also showed that most activated TSCs (96%) do not self-renew, but instead produce single-potential basal cells—the final TSC offspring—and therefore are lost from the TSC pool

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Next, the research team analyzed the telomere length of human TSCs, using bronchial and nasal cells donated by people with Dyskeratosis Congenita (DC)

Just like mice, repeated proliferation in humans also leads to the terminal differentiation of TSC and the depletion of the TSC pool

"In general, these data from mouse and human TSC studies show that many damage/repair cycles reduce the repair potential of the epithelium.

Anthony Atala, MD, editor-in-chief of stem cell translational medicine and director of the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine, said: "This latest research adds more scientific knowledge to the development of chronic lung diseases as we know it

references:

 "Repeated Injury Promotes Tracheobronchial Tissue Stem Cell Attrition" 21 September 2021, Stem Cells Translational Medicine .

DOI: 10.
1002/sctm.
21-0032