Differentiation of human pluripotent stem cells into red blood cells

Abstract

At present, the experimental technique to produce human red blood cells in vitro is complicated, and in order to optimize the induction steps, human pluripotent stem cells were differentiated into red blood cells through two induction steps. First, human pluripotent stem cells (including Rh negative A type umbilical cord mesenchymal stem cells (hUCMSCRh-A) and human iPS cells (hiPS)) were differentiated into CD31+ and CD34+ cells in BVF medium. PCR and flow cytometry were used to exam the expression of CD31 and CD34. We found that hUCMSCRh-A derived CD31+ and CD34+ cells were 5.3% and 22.7%, respectively; hiPS derived CD31+ and CD34+ cells were 31.2% and 8.2%, respectively. For the second induction step, the obtained CD31+ and CD34+ cells were differentiated into mature erythrocytes for 36 days under the addition of various growth factors. Through Giemsa staining, we found that the obtained mature erythrocytes were similar in morphology and size to normal human erythrocytes, and some obtained erythrocytes were enucleated. Globin expression was detected by real time RT-PCR, and the expression of β-globin was more than 20%. The obtained erythrocytes are collected into the centrifuge tube, and then erythrocytes were naturally settled and showed the red color. Our findings provide a novel and effective method for the quantity generation of human red blood cells in vitro.