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Reliance Life all set for live skin bank

Hemangi Balse

Reliance Life Science (RLS), the biotechnology arm of the Reliance group, will be setting up India’s first live skin bank in the next couple of months. The skin bank in Bombay is a part of its initiative in tissue engineering in the area of cell biology.

According to sources, the research centre has developed cultured skin which will be primarily used to address the skin problems of burn patients. It may also be used to treat diabetic ulcers.

The centre has already established the front end of the research work as a step towards setting up the proposed skin bank.

When contacted, a Reliance spokesman refused to comment on the issue.

The centre has already developed cultured epidermis, cultured dermis and composite skin. The centre will soon begin clinical trials for which “it is scaling up production of skin, a pilot project under the current group manufacturing process.”

RLS is currently busy working on the logistics for the skin bank and setting up cryogenic facilities.

As against the conventional method of recovery, live skin from the skin bank will help reduce the period a burn patient has to spend in hospital from 6-8 weeks to 2-3 weeks.

Moreover, the risk linked to hospital infections will be reduced phenomenally. What is more, bed turnovers in hospitals will improve. So more patients can be treated, sources add.

In the conventional method of treatment, skin from a cadaver is applied to the burn area. This increases the risk of the patient's body rejecting "foreign" skin. "The cultured (live) skin from the skin bank can be immediately applied on the burnt skin. In the meantime, the good skin from the patient can be cultured within two weeks and later applied," the source added.

India has about 3 million burn cases reported annually as well as a very high mortality rate in burn cases.

A strongly research driven company, RLS has already invested about $5 million in the business and an additional $20 million will be invested over a period of time. At present, RLS is concentrating on haematopoetic and embryonic stem cells.

RLS was listed by the National Institute of Health, US, as one of the 10 global companies working in the area of embryonic stem cells.

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