Why “Whose Cells” Matters in Regenerative Medicine

By Ned Swanson, MD, President & Chief Medical Officer, PolarityBio

As regenerative therapies advance in wound care, most conversations center on what a therapy contains - cells, matrix, or signaling components. But there’s another important component - where those elements come from.

The source of tissue matters because it influences how a therapy interacts with the body, how well it’s tolerated, and how closely it mimics natural healing processes. In regenerative medicine, the distinction between autologous and allogeneic approaches is essential.

Defining the Difference

In simple terms:

• Autologous therapies use tissue taken from the patient.

• Allogeneic therapies use tissue from another human.

Both approaches are widely used in medicine and can be effective depending on the clinical goal. However, they differ significantly in how they integrate with the body’s biology.

Autologous Therapies: Leveraging Native Biology

Autologous treatments are inherently personalized. Because the tissue comes from the patient, it’s fully compatible. These therapies often feature:

• Complete immune compatibility

• Natural cellular signaling

• Alignment with the patient’s own healing pathways

• Permanent results with continuous signaling that matures over time

• Cells capable of propagating, differentiating, and migrating indefinitely

Autologous strategies are often chosen when restoring function requires deep biological integration. The aim isn’t just to kickstart the healing process in the cells already present around the wound - it’s to restart the body’s own repair processes using its own components by directly contributing cell and tissue content that can become the source of healing itself.

Notably, when autologous approaches are successful, they can become single treatment solutions that don’t require repetitive applications.

Allogeneic Therapies: Availability and Standardization

Allogeneic approaches bring different benefits. Donor-derived materials can be:

• Produced in large quantities

• Standardized for consistency

• Ready for immediate use without harvesting tissue from the patient

These therapies often support the wound environment and provide structural and biological cues to aid healing. They’re particularly useful when speed, access, or simplicity is critical. However, because the tissue isn’t native, integration depends on how the body responds and adapts to the material.

Lessons from Other Fields

Other areas of medicine highlight the same principle: tissue source influences how therapies behave.

In oncology, for example, the origin of cells affects how long they persist and how deeply they integrate into the patient’s biology. There are multiple autologous cell therapies approved by the FDA for oncologic indications because the field began with autologous approaches given their advantages to integrate and persist. Allogeneic cell therapies are in development for oncologic indications due to their scale-up advantages, but questions remain if their outcomes will be able to match those of autologous therapies.

Chronic wounds present similar challenges: persistent inflammation and disrupted repair pathways create a hostile environment. In both cases, the question isn’t just whether a therapy works, but how naturally it can integrate with the body’s systems.

Implications for Regenerative Wound Care

When the goal is limited, such as providing temporary support or environmental modulation, allogeneic or acellular approaches may be appropriate (see previous post on cellular versus acellular therapies).
When the goal shifts toward reinitiating coordinated tissue repair and restoring native tissue behavior, the biological demands change. Tissue source becomes more than a logistical detail; it becomes central to how regeneration occurs.

Choosing the Right Biological Strategy

The most important question isn’t which approach is “better,” but what problem the therapy is designed to solve:

• Is the objective temporary support or durable integration?

• Is scalability the priority, or biologic precision?

• Is the therapy meant to assist healing or restart endogenous repair processes?

• Does the wound bed and surrounding peri-wound just need a small nudge to heal or does it require additional healthy cellular content to directly add a new source of healing

Clear understanding of tissue source helps clinicians and health systems evaluate regenerative therapies based on biological intent and move beyond category labels.

Looking Ahead

Across medicine, from oncology to diabetic foot ulcers, tissue source consistently shapes how therapies behave in the body. As wound care evolves, understanding the biological implications of autologous versus allogeneic strategies will be key to defining what regeneration truly means.