Neonatal transplant in hypoxic injury.

Hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy in neonates often causes long-term disabilities. Stem cell therapy may be a successful treatment for HIE. Neurogenic astrocytes with characteristics of neural stem cells (NSCs) can be cultured as adherent monolayers. Following reintroduction into the NSC niche of both neonatal and adult hosts, these astrocytes can be induced to generate neuronal progeny in vitro and in vivo. Thus, neurogenic astrocytes represent promising candidates for cell replacement therapy in HIE. Such an approach requires optimized cell cultivation protocols as well as extensive testing of donor cells to assess their capacity for engraftment, survival, and integration in the HIE animal models. In this chapter, we describe methods of generating the HIE model, generating and culturing monolayer neurogenic astrocytes, and transplanting these cells into HIE animal models.