Scientists develop safe and easy way to make stem cells

Editor's Choice Academic Journal Main Category: Stem Cell Research Also Included In: Biology / Biochemistry Article Date: 19 Jul 2013 - 5:00 PDT

Current ratings for: Scientists develop safe and easy way to make stem cells

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By using a cocktail of small molecules to chemically reprogram the adult tissue cells they say they can make induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) as versatile as embryonic stem cells, without running the risk of dangerous mutations or cancer that occurs when gene insertion is used to make iPS cells.

The chemical insertion method of inducing cells used by these researchers is simpler and easier than the gene insertion approach, which, they note, has also tended to limit the clinical application of iPS cells.

For their study, Deng Hongkui, a professor and stem-cell biologist at Peking University in Beijing, and colleagues, induced a pluripotent state in adult cells from mice using seven small-molecule compounds.

They started out by screening 10,000 small molecules. They were looking for a combination that would have the same effect as gene insertion.

They then had to work for another year fine-tuning the cocktail to achieve the hallmark of pluripotency and also to increase the efficiency of conversion.

They finally settled on a cocktail of seven small compounds, which they showed was able to convert 0.2% of the adult tissue cells into iPSCs, which is comparable to the gene insertion conversion rate.

They call the chemically induced pluripotent cells CiPSCs.

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Scientists develop safe and easy way to make stem cells