Development of a replacement for menopausal women's drug hormone therapy 'cell-based artificial ovaries'

Dec 12, 2024

A picture of cells collected from ovaries placed in a hydrogel structure and injected under the mouse. It produces hormones by cell-to-cell interactions.

Professor Lee Jung-ryul's team at Bundang Seoul National University Hospital (Professor Lee Kang-won, Dr. Choong-mo Yang, and Dr. Hee-sun Yang of Seoul National University Graduate School of Convergence Science and Technology) have developed a cell-based artificial ovary to replace drug hormone treatment in menopausal women. The increase in life expectancy is expected to give new hope to improve the quality of life of postmenopausal women in a modern society where life after menopause is almost half of life.

Menopause is an important turning point in a woman's life, usually beginning in her late 40s to early 50s. At this time, women's ovarian function begins to decrease gradually, and the decrease in ovarian function directly affects female hormone secretion. This is accompanied by symptoms such as ▲menorrhea ▲ facial flush ▲ cardiovascular disease ▲ osteoporosis ▲ mood change ▲ sleep disorder.

Hormone therapy can alleviate these menopausal symptoms and improve women's quality of life by supplementing rapidly decreasing hormones. Despite these advantages, many women are reluctant to treat hormones because hormone therapy has no other way than taking drugs, and it is known that this method increases the risk of breast cancer.

In response, Professor Lee Jung-ryul's team at Seoul National University Bundang Hospital conducted research to develop a cell-based artificial ovary that can replace hormone drug treatment and produce body-safe female hormones.

The professor's team produced a micro-sized ovarian cell hydrogel structure that separates hormone-producing cells from the ovaries and injects them in a minimally invasive manner. It has an ovarian-like structure, designed to interact with cells and produce hormones on its own. The professor's team confirmed that cell-based artificial ovaries successfully produce ovarian hormones in a 90-day in vitro culture. They were then injected into a menopausal mouse model and compared with controls (ovarian retention, ovarian resection, hormone drug treatment group).

As a result, the group of mice injected with artificial ovaries had increased levels of female hormones, and the typical symptoms of menopause, such as weight gain and osteoporosis, improved. In particular, the risk of breast cancer, which is considered a representative side effect of hormone treatment, has decreased. Breast tissue hyperplasia that can cause breast cancer did not occur and the expression of breast cancer-related markers was significantly reduced.

What is noteworthy in this study is that it has developed an artificial ovary in a form that can be easily applied by injection using biomaterials. This suggests that it could provide more convenient and safe hormone therapy methods for menopausal women in the future.

Professor Lee Jung-ryeol of obstetrics and gynecology at Seoul National University Bundang Hospital said, `Cell-based artificial ovaries are controlled and distributed by hormonal self-regulation mechanisms in the body, which can reduce the risk of hormone therapy that is replaced by drugs"This study is meaningful in that it has laid an important foundation for future clinical application" he said.

If cell-based menopause hormone therapy using human autologous or induced cells is realized through follow-up studies, it is expected that it can develop into a treatment that can replace existing drug hormone therapy.

Meanwhile, the study was recently published in the SCIE international medical journal 『Biomaterials Research" (IF 8.1).