Generation of induced pluripotent stem cells with one or two reprogramming factors

Researchers of the Max-Planck-Institute for Molecular Biomedicine, Prof. Schöler and his team from the Department of Cell and Developmental Biology, have developed a novel approach to induce pluripotency of somatic cells. When working with multipotent neural stem cells (NSCs), they realized that in certain genetic backgrounds, cell reprogramming can be achieved by ectopic expression of just two transcription factors [2, 4]. Further, Prof. Schöler and his team were able to demonstrate that for a certain scenario, exogenous expression of just one transcription factor (Oct4) is required and sufficient for NSC reprogramming [3, 4]. To summarize, they present new cell reprogramming protocols based on introducing a minimal number of transcription factors by means of exogenous expression, that, at the same time, take advantage of sufficient endogenous expression levels of other reprogramming factors in the targeted cell line [2, 3, 4]. Since the expression of oncogenes at unnatural levels in the targeted cell line can thereby be avoided, this new approach considerably advances the protocols that have been described in the context of early cell reprogramming procedures that establish pluripotency.

A priority establishing patent application has been filed in 2008. There are certain patent rights covering this technology (Title: Generation of Induced Pluripotent Stem (iPS) Cells): EP2297300B1, EP3293258B1, US9556454B2, CN102066556B (publication numbers).

[1] K. Takahashi and S. Yamanaka, Cell (2006) 126:663-676
[2] J. B. Kim et al., Nature (2008) 454:646-650
[3] J. B. Kim et al., Cell (2009) 136:411-419
[4] J. B. Kim et al., Nature Protocols (2009) 4(10):1464-1470