Could regenerative techniques restore hearing or balance by replacing lost sensory cells in the inner ear? Lab-created inner-ear organs, described today in Nature Communications, could provide helpful three-dimensional models for testing potential therapies.
The lab-built sac-like structure above, about 1 millimeter in size, contains fully-formed balance organs resembling the utricle and saccule, which sense head orientation and movement and send impulses to the brain. The tiny organs were built from mouse embryonic stem cells in a 3-D tissue culture in work led by Jeffrey Holt, PhD, of the F.M. Kirby Neurobiology Center at Boston Children’s Hospital and Eri Hashino, PhD, of the University of Indiana.
