Abstract
Summary Human pluripotent stem cells (hPSCs) could provide an infinite source of clinically relevant cells with potential applications in regenerative medicine. However, hPSC lines vary in their capacity to generate specialized cells, and the development of universal protocols for the production of tissue-specific cells remains a major challenge. Here, we have addressed this limitation for the endodermal lineage by developing a defined culture system to expand and differentiate human foregut stem cells (hFSCs) derived from hPSCs. hFSCs can self-renew while maintaining their capacity to differentiate into pancreatic and hepatic cells. Furthermore, near-homogenous populations of hFSCs can be obtained from hPSC lines which are normally refractory to endodermal differentiation. Therefore, hFSCs provide a unique approach to bypass variability between pluripotent lines in order to obtain a sustainable source of multipotent endoderm stem cells for basic studies and to produce a diversity of endodermal derivatives with a clinical value.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 293-306 |
| Number of pages | 14 |
| Journal | Stem Cell Reports |
| Volume | 1 |
| Issue number | 4 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 15 Oct 2013 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:This work was funded by a MRC senior nonclinical fellowship (L.V.), the Cambridge Hospitals National Institute for Health Research Biomedical Research Center (L.V., N.R.F.H.), the EU grant LivES (N.R.F.H.), the Evelyn trust (N.R.F.H.), the Medical Research Council (R.P.F., V.M.), and the Wellcome Trust (K.J.). N.A.H. is a Wellcome Trust senior clinical fellow (WT088566). The authors would like to thank Dr. William Mansfield and Charles-Etienne Duneau from the Cambridge Stem Cell Institute for performing tissue potency assays and Peter Humphries for confocal imaging of tissue outgrowths.
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Biochemistry
- Genetics
- Developmental Biology
- Cell Biology
