Clinical Trials (Adult Cells)

STEM CELLS ARE specialized types of cells that differ from typical cells because of two distinct qualities. First, stem cells can renew themselves for long periods of time. Second, stem cells have the potential to differentiate into many types of cells. For example, hepatocytes or liver cells can regenerate to eventually return a liver to its original size following surgical removal of part of it. Stem cells can be divided into three main categories: embryonic, umbilical, and adult. One major difference among the three is that they are all obtained differently. For example, embryonic stem cells are collected from the very early stages of a fertilized egg, called a blastocyst—whereas umbilical stem cells are obtained from the umbilical cord of a newborn baby, adult stem ...