Sci Rep. 2018 Apr 23;8(1):6375. doi: 10.1038/s41598-018-24714-3.

Development of new method to enrich human iPSC-derived renal progenitors using cell surface markers.

Hoshina A¹, Kawamoto T², Sueta SI¹, Mae SI¹, Araoka T¹, Tanaka H¹, Sato Y³, Yamagishi Y⁴, Osafune K⁵.

Abstract

Cell therapy using renal progenitors differentiated from human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) or induced pluripotent stem cells (hiPSCs) has the potential to significantly reduce the number of patients receiving dialysis therapy. However, the differentiation cultures may contain undifferentiated or undesired cell types that cause unwanted side effects, such as neoplastic formation, when transplanted into a body. Moreover, the hESCs/iPSCs are often genetically modified in order to isolate the derived renal progenitors, hampering clinical applications. To establish an isolation method for renal progenitors induced from hESCs/iPSCs without genetic modifications, we screened antibodies against cell surface markers. We identified the combination of four markers, CD9^-CD140a⁺CD140b⁺CD271⁺, which could enrich OSR1⁺SIX2⁺ renal progenitors. Furthermore, these isolated cells ameliorated renal injury in an acute kidney injury (AKI) mouse model when used for cell therapy. These cells could contribute to the development of hiPSC-based cell therapy and disease modeling against kidney diseases.