Abstract
Stimulated by the 2012 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine awarded for Shinya Yamanaka and Sir John Gurdon, there is an increasing interest in the induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells and reprograming technologies in medical science. While iPS cells are expected to open a new era providing enormous opportunities in biomedical sciences in terms of cell therapies and regenerative medicine, safety-related concerns for iPS cell-based cell therapy should be resolved prior to the clinical application of iPS cells. In this review, the pre-clinical investigations of cell therapy for spinal cord injury (SCI) using neural stem/progenitor cells derived from iPS cells, and their safety issues in vivo, are outlined. We also wish to discuss the strategy for the first human trails of iPS cell-based cell therapy for SCI patients.
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Acknowledgements
The original investigation on iPS cells was performed in collaboration with Prof Shinya Yamanaka (Center for iPS Cell Research and Application, Kyoto University, Japan). This work was supported by the Japan Science and Technology–California Institute for Regenerative Medicine collaborative program, grants from Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research from JSPS and the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology of Japan (MEXT), the project for realization of regenerative medicine and support for the core institutes for iPS cell research from MEXT and by a Grant-in-aid for the Global COE program from MEXT to Keio University.
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Nakamura, M., Okano, H. Cell transplantation therapies for spinal cord injury focusing on induced pluripotent stem cells. Cell Res 23, 70–80 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1038/cr.2012.171
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/cr.2012.171
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