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Scientists Found Two Metabolites That Can Influence the the Differentiation of Stem Cells
Ulijn Group led by Rein Ulijn from New York has found two metabolites that can influence the differentiation direction of stem cells. With the finding, it’ highly possible for the development of single reagents that can works to make the stem cells differentiate in the right direction and replace the traditional boosters made of complex compositions, helping to save in budget.
The present bimolecular cocktails working to make stem cells develop in specific directions must function for a reason, which is the basic foundation for the team to spot the exact compounds that play meaningful roles in the process.
It has long been known that the stiffness and softness of a compound can influence the differentaion of stem cells before 2011. To further probe on the theory, Ulijn, partners with a stem cell scientist from UK. They made fully advantages on the already found knowledge on this matter and began from the exploration on the stiffness and softness issue. According to the early finding, with soft gels, it’s likely to get neuron cells as a result, while in stiff gels, bone cells are more likely to be differentiated. The new team employed two peptides composed gels to control the stiffness of the gel and to decrease the variables in the process and make it easier to judge while add other metabolites to inspect whether they function to influence the developing direction of stem cells.
In the experiment, hundreds of metabolites were checked, and finally two of them were targeted, which are lysophosphatidic acid & cholesterol sulfate. In latter stages of the study, reverse experiments were conducted, where these metabolites were applied to stem cell culture, and the designed cells were differentiated.
The finding will be greatly helpful in decreasing the cost for target stem cell differentiation, especially for human primary cells and rat primary cells that are hard to get, and it can boost the development of bio medicals.