Spinal cord injury : how could dental stem cells from human apical papilla take up the challenge ?

Stem cells from the apical papilla (SCAP) derive from the neural crest and express numerous neurogenic markers. The goal of the present work was to investigate their therapeutic potential regarding the treatment of neural tissue damage, such as spinal cord injury (SCI). In the first part, we evaluated the impact of hydrogel properties on SCAP and we selected a fibrin hydrogel as the most suitable delivery system to evaluate the influence of SCAP for spinal cord regeneration. In the second part, we observed that implantation of a whole human apical papilla at the lesion site improved gait of spinally injured rats. Finally, in the third part, we demonstrated that SCAP have immunomodulatory properties and can stimulate oligodendrocyte progenitor cell differentiation. This work underlines the potential therapeutic benefits of SCAP for spinal cord repair.