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Disease Modeling with Tissue-Specific Stem Cells or Organoid

A special issue of International Journal of Molecular Sciences (ISSN 1422-0067). This special issue belongs to the section "Molecular Pathology, Diagnostics, and Therapeutics".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 November 2021) | Viewed by 7288

Special Issue Editor

Department of Life Sciences in Dentistry, Pusan National University School of Dentistry, 49, Busandaehak-ro, Mulgeum-eup, Yangsan 50612, Korea
Interests: intestinal organoid; salivary galnd organoid; adult stem cell; regeneration; inflammatory bowel disease; xerostomia; disease modeling; cell therapeutics

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Accurate and tractable disease models are essential for elucidating disease pathogenesis and for developing therapeutics by discovering novel targets. As stem cells are capable of self-renewal and differentiation, they are ideally suited both for generating these models and for obtaining the large quantities of cells required for drug screening. Beginning from the single stem cells, tools for disease modeling have been rapidly advanced. Recent advances in 3D culture technology allow pluripotent and multipotent stem cells to exhibit their remarkable self-organizing properties, and the resulting organoids reflect key structural and functional properties of organs such as kidney, lung, gut, brain and retina. Organoid technology can therefore be used to model human organ development and various human pathologies ‘in a dish’ with the properties that closely resemble the real organs in its structure and function. Additionally, patient-derived stem cells or organoids hold promise to predict drug response in a personalized fashion. Stem Cells and organoids open up new avenues for regenerative medicine and, in combination with editing technology, for gene therapy. Various applications of this technology are only beginning to be explored. Taken together, stem cells and organoids can be utilized as a modeling system for the investigation of stem cell biology, organ development and disease progression, as well as for drug discovery.

Therefore, we invite you to contribute original articles that describe pluripotent stem cell- or adult stem cell-derived tissue-specific disease-in-a-dish models, their application in the recapitulation and the elucidation of undelying mechanisms for diseases, as well as in drug screening. Review articles integrating relevant studies are also welcomed. The issues in both types of articles should be supported by sufficient data or evidence.

Dr. Hyung-Sik Kim
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. International Journal of Molecular Sciences is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. There is an Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal. For details about the APC please see here. Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • disease modeling
  • stem cells
  • organoid
  • disease-in-a-dish
  • drug discovery
  • personalized medicine

Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

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15 pages, 2689 KiB  
Article
Directional Persistence of Cell Migration in Schizophrenia Patient-Derived Olfactory Cells
by Jing Yang Tee and Alan Mackay-Sim
Int. J. Mol. Sci. 2021, 22(17), 9177; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/ijms22179177 - 25 Aug 2021
Cited by 6 | Viewed by 2555
Abstract
Cell migration is critical for brain development and linked to several neurodevelopmental disorders, including schizophrenia. We have shown previously that cell migration is dysregulated in olfactory neural stem cells from people with schizophrenia. Although they moved faster than control cells on plastic substrates, [...] Read more.
Cell migration is critical for brain development and linked to several neurodevelopmental disorders, including schizophrenia. We have shown previously that cell migration is dysregulated in olfactory neural stem cells from people with schizophrenia. Although they moved faster than control cells on plastic substrates, patient cells were insensitive to regulation by extracellular matrix proteins, which increase the speeds of control cells. As well as speed, cell migration is also described by directional persistence, the straightness of movement. The aim of this study was to determine whether directional persistence is dysregulated in schizophrenia patient cells and whether it is modified on extracellular matrix proteins. Directional persistence in patient-derived and control-derived olfactory cells was quantified from automated live-cell imaging of migrating cells. On plastic substrates, patient cells were more persistent than control cells, with straighter trajectories and smaller turn angles. On most extracellular matrix proteins, persistence increased in patient and control cells in a concentration-dependent manner, but patient cells remained more persistent. Patient cells therefore have a subtle but complex phenotype in migration speed and persistence on most extracellular matrix protein substrates compared to control cells. If present in the developing brain, this could lead to altered brain development in schizophrenia. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Disease Modeling with Tissue-Specific Stem Cells or Organoid)
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Review

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12 pages, 602 KiB  
Review
Necrotizing Enterocolitis: Overview on In Vitro Models
by Luigia De Fazio, Isadora Beghetti, Salvatore Nicola Bertuccio, Concetta Marsico, Silvia Martini, Riccardo Masetti, Andrea Pession, Luigi Corvaglia and Arianna Aceti
Int. J. Mol. Sci. 2021, 22(13), 6761; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/ijms22136761 - 23 Jun 2021
Cited by 14 | Viewed by 4294
Abstract
Necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC) is a gut inflammatory disorder which constitutes one of the leading causes of morbidity and mortality for preterm infants. The pathophysiology of NEC is yet to be fully understood; several observational studies have led to the identification of multiple factors [...] Read more.
Necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC) is a gut inflammatory disorder which constitutes one of the leading causes of morbidity and mortality for preterm infants. The pathophysiology of NEC is yet to be fully understood; several observational studies have led to the identification of multiple factors involved in the pathophysiology of the disease, including gut immaturity and dysbiosis of the intestinal microbiome. Given the complex interactions between microbiota, enterocytes, and immune cells, and the limited access to fetal human tissues for experimental studies, animal models have long been essential to describe NEC mechanisms. However, at present there is no animal model perfectly mimicking human NEC; furthermore, the disease mechanisms appear too complex to be studied in single-cell cultures. Thus, researchers have developed new approaches in which intestinal epithelial cells are exposed to a combination of environmental and microbial factors which can potentially trigger NEC. In addition, organoids have gained increasing attention as promising models for studying NEC development. Currently, several in vitro models have been proposed and have contributed to describe the disease in deeper detail. In this paper, we will provide an updated review of available in vitro models of NEC and an overview of current knowledge regarding its molecular underpinnings. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Disease Modeling with Tissue-Specific Stem Cells or Organoid)
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