Li Liu , Ziyang Lin , Junzheng Yang^✉

Abstract

Stroke is a kind of sudden onset of cerebral circulatory disorders with transient or permanent symptoms and signs of brain dysfunction clinically, it has a high incidence rate and a high mortality rate and is one of the severe cerebrovascular diseases that threaten human life and disability seriously and bring the heavy economic burden to patients and their families, there was no ideal treatment for it. Mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) are a type of primitive undifferentiated cells with multi-directional differentiation potential and self-replication ability, they have the characteristic of convenient source and can differentiate into various types of somatic cells including nerve cells, cardiomyocytes, and osteoblasts and secrete various growth factors including brain derived neurotrophic factor, nerve growth factor, and epidermal growth factor, demonstrating the enormous application potential in many kinds of diseases including stroke. In this review, we summarized the basic characteristics and sources of MSCs, recent research progression of preclinical application and clinical application of MSCs in stroke, and the application limitations and the prospect were also discussed, hope our review may provide some useful clues for the related researchers.