Inexorably, stem cell biology is finding its way into a broad range of medical disciplines, including aesthetic surgery.

The best reconstructive strategies or the best strategies to augment soft tissue involves using the patient's own fat tissue rather than implants. Implants have their own set of long-term problems that one's own tissue doesn’t have.

The federal government is not ignoring this issue. The Adipose Stem Cell Center at the University of Pittsburgh has recently received multimillion-dollar grants from the National Institutes of Health toward breast cancer reconstruction applications, as well as from the Department of Defense, which is interested in how adipose stem cells can be used for the aesthetic reconstruction of wounded soldiers.

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