Donor-Derived Brain Tumor Following Neural Stem Cell Transplantation in an Ataxia Telangiectasia Patient

Damaged neural cells cannot be replaced by the body, therefore scientists think that neural stem cel...

Damaged neural cells cannot be replaced by the body, therefore scientists think that neural stem cell transplants (from embryonic cells) should make it possible to replace these cells when they are lost in neurodegenerative diseases or damaged by strokes or trauma. However, stem cells and tumor cells behave in a similar way, they tend to be undifferentiated and divide indefinitely, which means that patients receiving stem cell transplants need to be closely monitored for tumor development.

In this particular study a patient with Ataxia telangiectasia, a primary immunodeficiency disease in which ATM protein production is deficient, was injected with neural stem cells. Following these injections tumors developed in the brain and spinal cord which were found to contain both XX and XY cells and two normal copies of the ATM gene which were typed and found to come from two donors.

This tumor development could have occurred because the patient had an impaired immune system, and was therefore unable to reject tumor cells. Suggesting that further work needs to be done to assess the safety of neural stem cell transplants and safety in the context of immunocompromised patients.

Link to Plos