Optical imaging of subacute airway remodeling and adipose stem cell engraftment after airway injury

Abstract

Acquired airway injury is frequently caused by endotracheal intubations, long-term tracheostomies, trauma, airway burns, and some systemic diseases. An effective and less invasive technique for both the early assessment and the early interventional treatment of acquired airway stenosis is therefore needed. Optical coherence tomography (OCT) has been proposed to have unique potential for early monitoring from the proliferative epithelium to the cartilage in acute airway injury. Additionally, stem cell therapy using adipose stem cells is being investigated as an option for early interventional treatment in airway and lung injury. Over the past decade, it has become possible to monitor the level of injury using OCT and to track the engraftment of stem cells using stem cell imaging in regenerative tissue. The purpose of this study was to assess the engraftment of exogenous adipose stem cells in injured tracheal epithelium with fluorescent microscopy and to detect and monitor the degree of airway injury in the same tracheal epithelium with OCT. OCT detected thickening of both the epithelium and basement membrane after tracheal scraping. The engraftment of adipose stem cells was successfully detected by fluorescent staining in the regenerative epithelium of injured tracheas. OCT has the potential to be a high-resolution imaging modality capable of detecting airway injury in combination with stem cell imaging in the same tracheal mucosa. Berns, S. C. George, Z. Chen, and M. Brenner, "Detection and monitoring of early airway injury effects of halfmustard (2-chloroethylethylsulfide) exposure using high-resolution optical coherence tomography," J. Biomed.

Stem cell therapy for lung diseases: From fundamental aspects to clinical applications

“…In a randomized, placebo-controlled pilot study, ADSCs showed significant protective effects on ALI. Optical imaging analysis further revealed that they enhance subacute airway remodeling, and ameliorate ventilator-induced lung injury in rats (60). The major protective effects were attributed to eNOS and eNOS-derived NO (61).…”

Stem/progenitor cells in endogenous repairing responses: new toolbox for the treatment of acute lung injury

“…In a randomized, placebo-controlled pilot study, ADSCs showed significant protective effects on ALI. Optical imaging analysis further indicated that they promote the subacute airway remodeling, and ameliorates ventilator-induced lung injury in rats [ 33 , 34 ]. The main protective reasons referred to eNOS and eNOS-derived NO [ 35 ].…”

Intravital longitudinal wide-area imaging of dynamic bone marrow engraftment and multilineage differentiation through nuclear-cytoplasmic labeling

“…However, despite its frequent medical practices, how the transferred BM cells including stem cells and progenitors behave inside the bone marrow of the recipient at early time point after the BMT is not well understood yet [ 7 – 10 ]. Especially, our knowledge on the cellular-level behaviors of the transplanted BM cells which dynamically change over time after the BMT is relatively limited, which has been one of the limiting factors in previous efforts to improve the efficacy of BMT and to reduce the detrimental side effects [ 11 , 12 ].…”