Lab-grown skin could revolutionize grafts

• Last year, in a lab in Japan, a mouse grew hair. That may not sound like much of an accomplishment, but it was an extraordinary feat for the scientists watching it. For the first time, skin grown in a lab, then transplanted onto a mouse, was doing all the things skin is needed to do — produce sweat, secrete oils, grow hair.

In a study in the journal Science Advances, scientists from Japan’s RIKEN Center for Developmental Biology detail how they were able to craft fully functional skin from stem cells made from the gums of mice. When transplanted onto mice with suppressed i mmune systems, the skin integrated well and even made connections with surrounding nerve and muscle tissue.

Though they’re a good five to 10 years away from replicating the same technique in humans, the scientists say it could revolutionize skin grafts, which currently rely on skin taken from other parts of the body or artificial skin. The former poses medical challenges, the latter lacks the ability to grow hair or produce oils like normal skin — which, at best, makes the grafts look different from the rest of the body, and at worst can be a health hazard.

The project took advantage of a technique discovered in 2006 that allows researchers to genetically reprogram any old cell and turn it into a stem cell. This meant cells taken from the mice’s gums could then be guided down a different developmental pathway.

When transplanted onto other mice, the skin developed normally to form the various layers of skin responsible for the organ’s functions.