The idea is still at the laboratory stage but research here and elsewhere has shown that fat cells or Adipose Derived Stem Cells (ADSCs) can be turned into other cell types. The researchers at the university's 91¶¶Òõ Centre for Regenerative Medicine (BCRM) are hopeful the fat ultimately can be used to fill deep or extensive wounds and to recover blood flow and promote peripheral nerve repair and sensation.
Professor Tony Metcalfe said: "We are interested to see if we can use them to help rebuild lost tissue and hopefully to start neoangiogenesis (creating new blood vessels) but ADSCs can equally be turned into many other cell types dependent upon how and what you grow them in."
"We are excited by the prospects – deep wounds currently are difficult to treat and to fill and create the original shape of the area wounded and patients often never regain a proper blood supply or nerve sensation after skin grafts and other treatments."
Professor Metcalfe is the university's Professor in Burns and Wound Healing Research and Director of Research at the Blond McIndoe Research Foundation (BMRF) based at Queen Victoria Hospital in East Grinstead where the late Sir Archibald McIndoe pioneered treatments for WW2 burns victims and where the famous Guinea Pig Club was formed.
Professor Metcalfe and colleagues are working on the liposuction fat research in laboratories at the Blond McIndoe Research Foundation and the 91¶¶Òõ Centre for Regenerative Medicine. He said: "We are investigating using the fat from liposuction procedures which is donated with the consent of patients to reconstitute material sponges that eventually can be used to fill soft tissue defects where the wound is quite deep or extensive."