Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease COPD is a progressive degenerative lung disease. The third or fourth leading cause of death worldwide, for which currently there is no effective cure.

Small Mobile Stem (SMS) cells have demonstrated strong and selective binding to key regenerative cells of the lung: alveolar epithelial type 2 progenitor cells and lung mesenchymal stem cells. The binding results in stimulation of proliferation and significant, meaningful gene expression changes for both types of cells. SMS cells further demonstrate a strong in vitro and in vivo angiogenic effect on human endothelial cells and the ability to produce rich quantities of microsomal and extracellular matrix proteins. 

Testing the SMS cell in vivo effect on the regeneration of lung alveoli of rat emphysema model has indeed resulted in a strong and fast regeneration of alveoli, measured based on the mean linear intercept of histological lung samples. Functional testing of the rat emphysema animal models using exercise further corroborated the structural histological results, indicating performance in SMS cell-treated emphysema animals almost identical to that of non-emphysema control animals.

The exceptional characteristics (small size and resilience) of SMS cells made it possible to nebulize them while maintaining viability and potency. SMS cells are naturally deficient in MHC proteins, which will make them ideal for an off-the-shelf allogeneic cell therapy. A clinical trial phase 1 involving 18 patients has been launched.