Chelsea Briganti is a senior at the Parsons New School for Design, and has produced a device that collects menstrual blood for adult stem cells. Finally!
Made of medical-grade silicone and resembling a thick-ass condom, Mademoicell (clever!) works like a tampon. Except instead of plugging it in and then chucking it, you stash it in the fridge and save it once it's filled up. Once you get past the nastiness of the concept, it makes pretty good sense. Menstrual stem cells offer the benefit of stem cells without creating a wake of moral quandaries. "The stem cells found in menstrual blood possess embyronic stem cell markers, which means that they can differentiate between nine different types of cells," Briganti says. "These are more potent than bone marrow." Pre-clinical trials are shaping up to show them as one of the most promising, renewable, non-invasive sources of stem cells.
Mademoicell is available for $75 for three, but it's obviously a conceptual product meant to highlight the issue (you can't take a packet of stem cells to your doctor yet, and nobody wants to find that next to your leftovers in the fridge). Selling Mademoicell is also going to be tough considering this is the public perception of menses. But with stem cells making inroads in the cosmetics industry, menstrual stem cells could one day do the same.
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