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Long-term xeno-free culture of human pluripotent stem cells on hydrogels with optimal elasticity

Higuchi A 1 , Kao SH 1 , Ling QD 2 , Chen YM 1 , Li HF 1 , Alarfaj AA 3 Show all authors , Munusamy MA 3 , Murugan K 4 , Chang SC 5 , Lee HC 5 , Hsu ST 6 , Kumar SS 7 , Umezawa A 8

Affiliations 

  • 1 Department of Chemical and Materials Engineering, National Central University, No. 300 Jhongli, Taoyuan, 32001 Taiwan
  • 2 Cathay Medical Research Institute, Cathay General Hospital, No. 32, Ln 160, Jian-Cheng Road, Hsi-Chi City, Taipei, 221, Taiwan
  • 3 Department of Botany and Microbiology, College of Science, King Saud University, P.O. Box 2455, Riyadh 11451, Saudi Arabia
  • 4 Division of Entomology, Department of Zoology, School of Life Sciences, Bharathiar University, Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu, India
  • 5 Department of Surgery, Cathay General Hospital, No.280, Sec. 4, Ren'ai Rd., Da'an Dist., Taipei, 10693, Taiwan
  • 6 Department of Internal Medicine, Taiwan Landseed Hospital, 77, Kuangtai Road, Pingjen City, Taoyuan 32405, Taiwan
  • 7 Department of Medical Microbiology and Parasitology, Universities Putra Malaysia, Serdang 43400, Slangor, Malaysia
  • 8 Department of Reproduction, National Research Institute for Child Health and Development, 2-10-1 Okura, Setagaya-ku, Tokyo 157-8535, Japan
Sci Rep, 2015 Dec 14;5:18136.
PMID: 26656754 DOI: 10.1038/srep18136

Abstract

The tentative clinical application of human pluripotent stem cells (hPSCs), such as human embryonic stem cells and human induced pluripotent stem cells, is restricted by the possibility of xenogenic contamination resulting from the use of mouse embryonic fibroblasts (MEFs) as a feeder layer. Therefore, we investigated hPSC cultures on biomaterials with different elasticities that were grafted with different nanosegments. We prepared dishes coated with polyvinylalcohol-co-itaconic acid hydrogels grafted with an oligopeptide derived from vitronectin (KGGPQVTRGDVFTMP) with elasticities ranging from 10.3 to 30.4 kPa storage moduli by controlling the crosslinking time. The hPSCs cultured on the stiffest substrates (30.4 kPa) tended to differentiate after five days of culture, whereas the hPSCs cultured on the optimal elastic substrates (25 kPa) maintained their pluripotency for over 20 passages under xeno-free conditions. These results indicate that cell culture matrices with optimal elasticity can maintain the pluripotency of hPSCs in culture.

* Title and MeSH Headings from MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine.

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