News
28th Mar 2016

Researchers grow new vocal cords from cells

Those that have lost their voice may soon have something to sing about!

Author
Sing Up

A research team from the University of Wisconsin has taken cells from living people and cells from a cadaver and found that when they are assembled just so, the cells enable people to grow new vocal cords/folds.

"Part of the advantage of using an engineered tissue is that we can customize the size of the tissue to fit the defect, and also to fit the size of the vocal fold in the male or female or child that would be the recipient." says Dr. Nathan Welham, who helped to lead this research.

Unsurprisingly, this cell regrowth is not easily accomplished! The tissue "must be soft and pliable enough to be set into vibration by an air stream, propagate a travelling wave across its surface, similar to a wave that moves across a body of water, and also must be strong enough to withstand rapid acceleration and deceleration and repeated impact stress as the tissue vibrates at rates in the hundreds or up to a thousand times per second. There is no other tissue in the human body that is subject to these types of bio-mechanical demand" says Welham.

When blown on as demonstration, the new tissue sounds a bit like a kazoo — an indication that it has the right properties needed to create a voice inside a human larynx!

The team is still testing, they stress, and are currently checking for immunity response.

 

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