CRI听力:Nasal Stem Cells Help to Cure Infant Hearing Loss

Noses comes in all shapes and sizes, and Australian scientists are now trumpeting a new use for the most prominent human organ.

Scientists in Sydney have found that nasal stem cells have the potential to reverse or even restore hearing in children with early onset hearing problems.

Sharon Oleskevich is the lead researcher on the project at the University of New South Wales. She says that cells taken from adult noses are easy to harvest.

"These stem cells are easy to get, they are easy to access. They are abundant and they are multi-potent which means they can turn into different types of cells."

Scientists found that the mucosa-derived nasal stem cells could be implanted into the cochlea, or the inner ear, to help preserve its functioning.

This procedure has been tested on laboratory mice, yielding significant results according to Oleskevich:

"The animals that received stem cells showed improved hearing compared to the sham, or placebo injected animals. We had not completely restored their hearing but there was a significant improvement in their level of hearing."

Often, hearing loss is inherited and can be detected during infancy or early childhood.

The Sydney scientists believe that their study may contribute to the treatment of deaf children, greatly improving their quality of life.

Deafness in the young can have dramatic, long term implications, according to Oleskevich:

"Childhood hearing loss is not just about deafness. It has obvious implications for language development, psycho-social development, and definitely the potential for mental health issues later down the track."

Because mice have similar hearing to humans, scientists were able to closely monitor the results.

So far, findings are proving positive, but it is still expected to take at least ten years before trials will be able to be conducted on children.

The research findings are published in the science journal Stem Cells.

For CRI, I am Li Dong.