American doctors announced on Wednesday the successful regeneration of loss muscle tissue in traumatic injury patients using materials taken from a pig's bladder. The study, published in the journal Science Translational Medicine, showed for the first time that functional muscle tissue could regenerate in people who experienced major muscle loss.

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Although the study involved only five male patients, the positive results provided a glimmer of hope to patients who have suffered from major war injuries.  Of the five patients, two were US soldiers whose leg muscles were badly damaged by bomb explosions.

 The US Defense Department invested US $3 million over five years in this study, which was led by Dr. Stephen Badylak from the University of Pittsburgh.

In vehicle accidents, bomb explosions, and other traumas, a large amount of muscle is usually lost. The body cannot replace the lost muscle and instead forms a scar tissue which cannot function in the same way as the original muscle. 

Treatments usually include removal of the scar tissue or muscle replacement using muscle from other parts of the body. According to the researchers, these methods do not produce satisfying outcomes and are actually hard on the patients.

Dr. Badylak said no treatment has ever worked before. They have already tried stem cell therapy and other modern surgeries, to no avail.

In the study, the doctors implanted the patients with material taken from the urinary bladder of a pig. The "extracellular matrix," which is the non-cellular part of the tissue that contains collagen, served as scaffolding for the regeneration process. The pig material served to recruit stem cells present in the body to rebuild the healthy muscle tissue at the injury site, researchers explained. Biopsies later confirmed that the muscle had grown once again.

Three of the subjects, including the soldiers, were assessed after six months and were found to have improved their strength in five categories by at least 20%. The other two patients also demonstrated significant improvement, just not in all five categories.

As of now, Badylak said four more patients have since been implanted with the pig material and have exhibited good outcomes.