Clonal culturing of human embryonic stem cells on laminin-521/E-cadherin matrix in defined and xeno-free environment

Summary

Lack of robust methods for establishment and expansion of pluripotent human embryonic stem (hES) cells still hampers development of cell therapy. Laminins (LN) are a family of highly cell-type specific basement membrane proteins important for cell adhesion, differentiation, migration and phenotype stability. Here we produce and isolate a human recombinant LN-521 isoform and develop a cell culture matrix containing LN-521 and E-cadherin, which both localize to stem cell niches in vivo. This matrix allows clonal derivation, clonal survival and long-term self-renewal of hES cells under completely chemically defined and xeno-free conditions without ROCK inhibitors. Neither LN-521 nor E-cadherin alone enable clonal survival of hES cells. The LN-521/E-cadherin matrix allows hES cell line derivation from blastocyst inner cell mass and single blastomere cells without a need to destroy the embryo. This method can facilitate the generation of hES cell lines for development of different cell types for regenerative medicine purposes.

Authors Rodin S, Antonsson L, Niaudet C, Simonson OE, Salmela E, Hansson EM, Domogatskaya A, Xiao Z, Damdimopoulou P, Sheikhi M, Inzunza J, Nilsson AS, Baker D, Kuiper R, Sun Y, Blennow E, Nordenskjöld M, Grinnemo KH, Kere J, Betsholtz C, Hovatta O, Tryggvason K
Journal Nature communications
Publication Date 2014;5:3195
PubMed 24463987
DOI 10.1038/ncomms4195

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