Proteins Transform Skin Cells to Embryonic-Like Stem Cells

As most readers will know, the hope for stem cells is that these kind of cells can be transformed in to any type of tissue, such as being grown in to tissue needed for a transplant.  In 2007 a major announcement was made announcing the concept of cell transformation, specifically by groups at Kyoto University and University of Wisconsin – Madison.  This new, major development builds on that work by using proteins instead of genes to reprogram skin cells in to more embryonic-like cells. 

This new  development now means that scientist are one step closer to using existing cells rather than embryonic sourced stem cells for research.   

Normal stem cells are harvested from embryo’s and come with a host of scientific, political and ethical objections.  Newer techniques are beginning to quell some of these objections, such as the announcement of a technique to harvest stem cells without destroying the host embryo.  You can read more about that here.  The new approach announced April 23, involves a significant change in the transformation method of acquiring stem cells – by using proteins instead of genes. 

The traditional approach for turning existing cells in to embryonic-like cells is risky because genes are used to reprogram a cell.  These genes are transported by using a virus that may cause unwanted side effects, such as undesired genetic changes in the target cell.  This new method achieves the same results as prior methods, but uses proteins to cause the changes in the target cell, rather than genes.  This is considered much safer because there is a lower risk of unwanted genetic side effects in the target cells. 

Sheng Ding of the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, CA led the research and specifically “engineered these four proteins so that they can penetrate the cell.” 

While this is a significant development, the science of cell reprogramming is at an early stage of development.  This new development was done on a certain type of skin-cell from mice, and researchers are hopeful, but not currently, of replicating these kind of results with human cells. 

There are also large problems and questions surrounding the efficiency of systems and methods that transform cells.  Much work needs to be done to improve the performance of the cell reprogramming methods, and it will be years before these kinds of cell-reprogramming systems are available for clinical use, much less there being used to treat patients. 

Currently there is a race to commercialize the technique for updating cells.  Several deals have been struck between bio-tech startups and universities, such as the one announced last month between start-up iZumi Bio, Inc. of South San Francisco and Kyoto University, the developers of the original cell reprogramming techniques. 

Journal Article Link: http://www.cell.com/cell-stem-cell/fulltext/S1934-5909(09)00159-3

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