2021/01/27
Keio University School of Medicine
Japan Agency for Medical Research and Development
A research group led by Senior Lecturer Shugo Tohyama and Assistant Professor Shota Someya of the Department of Cardiology, Keio University School of Medicine, and Project Associate Professor Jun Fujita of the Endowed Department of Severe Heart Failure Therapeutics at the same university, has successfully developed a culture medium for the simple and efficient proliferation of human iPS cells in a joint research project with Human Metabolome Technologies, Inc. and Ajinomoto Co., Inc.
Human induced pluripotent stem cells (human iPS cells) hold promise for "regenerative medicine," which involves transplanting therapeutic cells created in vitro into the body, due to their pluripotency—the ability to theoretically differentiate into all cell types that constitute the body. However, when a large number of cells are required for transplantation, a large amount of human iPS cells must be cultured using a medium for human iPS cells, which has been a significant cost barrier.
Therefore, the joint research group aimed to develop a culture medium for the simple and efficient proliferation of human iPS cells. First, focusing on all the amino acids contained in the culture medium, the group discovered that the consumption of the essential amino acid tryptophan was the highest, and that removing tryptophan from the medium halted the proliferation of human iPS cells and induced cell death. Furthermore, through the extremely simple process of adding tryptophan to a commonly used culture medium for human iPS cells, they succeeded in efficiently proliferating the cells while maintaining their ability to differentiate into any cell type (pluripotency). This research is expected to solve the major challenge of producing large quantities of human iPS cells and cells for transplantation, thereby contributing to cost reduction in regenerative medicine.
The results of this research were published in the American scientific journal "iScience," published by Cell Press, on January 26, 2021 (U.S. Eastern Time).
Please see below for the full press release.