Human Ocular Epithelial Cells Endogenously Expressed SOX2 and OCT4 Yield High Efficiency of Pluripotency Reprogramming

Abstract

Purpose A variety of pluripotency reprogramming frequencies from different somatic cells has been observed, indicating that the cell origin is a critical factor for pluripotency reprogramming. Identifying the cell sources for efficient induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) generation, and defining their advantages or disadvantages on reprogramming, is therefore important. The purpose of this study is to investigate efficiency of human iPSCs generation from conjunctival tissues derived-ocular epithelial cells (OECs) and lineage-differentiation potentials of OEC-iPSCs. Methods We compared the endogenous expression levels of pluripotency factors and the reprogramme efficiencies between human OECs and ocular stromal cells (OSCs). Real-time PCR, microarray analysis , western blotting and Immunostaining assays were employed to compare OECsiPSCs with OSCiPSCs in molecular bases of reprogramming efficiency and preferred lineage-differentiation potentials. Results We confirmed that OECs endogenously express reprogramming factors OCT4A (the specific OCT 4 isoform on pluripotency reprogramming) and SOX2. Reprogramming OECs yield very high efficiency of iPSCs generation using the traditional KMOS reprogramming protocol. Furthermore, OECsiPSCs display excellent potentials for ocular epithelial cell-type differentiation. Conclusion The findings in this study not only uncover OECs could serve as a new somatic cell source for high efficiency of iPSCs generation, but also demonstrate that OECs-generated iPSCs may be advantageous in ocular epithelial differentiation for cell replacement therapy.