Hepatic differentiation of pluripotent stem cells

Abstract In regenerative medicine pluripotent stem cells are con-sidered to be a valuable self-renewing source for thera-peutic cell transplantations, given that a functionalorgan-specific phenotype can be acquired by in vitro dif-ferentiation protocols. Furthermore, derivatives of pluri-potent stem cells that mimic fetal progenitorstagescouldserve as an important tool to analyze organ developmentwith in vitro approaches. Because of ethical issuesregarding the generation of human embryonic stem (ES)cells, other sources for pluripotent stem cells are inten-sively studied. Like in less developed vertebrates, pluri-potent stem cells can be generated from the femalegermline even in mammals, via parthenogenetic activa-tion of oocytes. Recently, testis-derived pluripotent stemcells were derived from the male germline. Therefore, wecompared two different hepatic differentiation approach-es and analyzed the generation of definitive endodermprogenitor cells and their further maturation intoahepaticphenotype using murine parthenogenetic ES cells, germ-line-derived pluripotent stem cells, and ES cells.Applyingquantitative RT-PCR, both germline-derived pluripotentcell lines show similar differentiation capabilities as nor-mal murine ES cells and can be considered an alternativesource for pluripotent stem cells in regenerativemedicine.