Person:

Dong, Tingting

Stem cell technology has facilitated the development of human cell culture models of disease that can be used to study pathogenesis and test therapeutic candidates. These models hold particular promise for complex neurological diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease (AD) because existing animal models have been unable to fully recapitulate all aspects of pathology. We recently reported the design and characterization of a novel three-dimensional (3D) culture system that exhibits key events in the pathogenic cascade of AD, including extracellular aggregation of amyloid β peptides and accumulation of hyperphosphorylated/aggregated tau protein. Here we provide instructions for the generation and analysis of 3D human neural cell cultures, including the production of genetically modified human neural progenitor cells (hNPCs) with familial AD (FAD) mutations, the differentiation of the hNPCs in a 3D Matrigel matrix, and the analysis of AD pathologenesis in this model. The same principles may be applicable to models of other inherited neurodegenerative diseases characterized by the aberrant aggregation of misfolded proteins.

Diabetes, a highly prevalent disease that affects 9.3% of Americans, often leads to severe complications and slow wound healing. Preclinical studies have suggested that low level light therapy (LLLT) can accelerate wound healing in diabetic subjects, but significant improvements must be made to overcome the absence of persuasive evidence for its clinical use. We demonstrate here that LLLT can be combined with topical Coenzyme Q10 (CoQ10) to heal wounds in diabetic mice significantly faster than LLLT alone, CoQ10 alone, or controls. LLLT followed by topical CoQ10 enhanced wound healing by 68~103% in diabetic mice in the first week and more than 24% in the second week compared with untreated controls. All wounds were fully healed in two weeks following the dual treatment, in contrast to only 50% wounds or a fewer being fully healed for single or sham treatment. The accelerated healing was corroborated by at least 50% higher hydroxyproline levels, and tripling cell proliferation rates in LLLT and CoQ10 treated wounds over controls. The beneficial effects on wound healing were probably attributed to additive enhancement of ATP production by LLLT and CoQ10 treatment. The combination of LLLT and topical CoQ10 is safe and convenient, and merits further clinical study.