Indian Stem Cell Scientists Find Clues To Birth Defects
(wz) In a discovery that could have a far-reaching impact on the development of drugs, scientists in Karnataka’s Manipal town have for the first time found clues to how defects occur during foetal growth.
Researchers from the Manipal Institute of Regenerative Medicine have discovered that the presence of very low amounts of an endotoxin, a potentially toxic natural compound, in the foetal environment can cause defects in the development of tissues in a growing foetus.
Gram-negative bacterial lipopolysaccahrides (LPS) are the main antigenic components of the cell wall of harmful bacteria that cause vaginosis, which is a common bacterial infection of the maternal genital tract.
LPS, which is harmful for foetuses, is regularly shed in the environment where the embryo grows when the mother is suffering from vaginosis.
Silent infections of gram-negative bacteria like Chlamydia trachomatis can also cause birth defects with poorly developed tissues and organs of the foetus.
An understanding of the molecular mechanisms of such pathogenesis remains obscure owing to ethical issues dogging the use of human embryos in research.
‘We have, therefore, used embryoid bodies as a tool to understand the effect of endotoxins on the induction of lineages in a developing foetus,’ Kaushik Deb, principal scientist of the Manipal Institute’s embryonic stem cell programme and chief researcher of the team, told IANS. more…
From: »NewsPost India«