A YouTube presentation by Joy Kong, MD explaining the therapeutic role of mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs). The speaker emphasizes that MSCs function largely via signaling—hence the proposed rename to "medicinal signaling cells"—releasing molecules including exosomes that instruct the immune system and local cells. A key point: MSCs communicate with resident/local stem cells which then regenerate tissue, a process that unfolds over days.
The kind of stem cell therapy I do focuses a lot on mesenchymal stem cells, and they've been proposed to be renamed medicinal signaling cells because of how they produce these signals that have medicinal properties. So they basically are sending out all these molecules through multiple mechanisms, and one of them is through exosomes, and they're sending out all this information so that the body can come in and can start produce the right response, either through the immune system or through the local environment by talking with the local cells. One important conversation between the mesenchymal stem cells and the local cells is talking with the local stem cells. So when these mesenchymal stem cells start sending the signals to these local stem cells, they are the ones that's regenerating your tissue, and that takes time, so that takes days.
