Swiss scientists develop world's first 3D cell model to boost treatments for lip injuries

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In a world-first, Swiss scientists have developed 3D cell models using lip cells, an advance that can help develop new treatments for injuries and infections.

To date, models using lip cells -- which perform differently from other skin cells -- have not been available.

"The lip is a very prominent feature of our face," said Dr Martin Degen of the University of Bern in Switzerland.

"Any defects in this tissue can be highly disfiguring. But until now, human lip cell models for developing treatments were lacking," Degen added.

To fill the gap, the scientists successfully immortalised donated lip cells. This enabled them to develop clinically relevant lip models in the lab,

The team selected skin cells from tissue donated by two patients: one undergoing treatment for a lip laceration, and one undergoing treatment for a cleft lip.

Using a retroviral vector, the team deactivated a gene that stops a cell's life cycle. They also altered the length of the telomeres on the ends of each chromosome to improve the cells' longevity.

The new cell lines were then tested rigorously to retain the same characteristics as primary cells; and looked for any chromosomal abnormalities, revealed the scientists in the paper published in Frontiers in Cell and Developmental Biology.

Finally, they carried out tests to see how the cells might perform as future experimental models for lip healing or infections.

They scratched samples of the cells to see if the cells could act as accurate proxies for wound healing,

While untreated cells closed the wound in eight hours, those treated with growth factors closed the wound more quickly. These results matched those seen in skin cells from other body parts.

After developing 3D models using the cells, the scientists infected them with Candida albicans -- a yeast that can cause serious infections in people with weak immune systems or cleft lips.

The cells performed as expected, and the pathogen rapidly invaded the model as it would infect real lip tissue.

"We are convinced that 3D models established from healthy immortalised lip cells have the potential to be very useful in many other fields of medicine," said Degen, noting that the proof-of-concept, once expanded, could benefit thousands of patients.

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