Basic Study
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2015. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastroenterol. Oct 21, 2015; 21(39): 11118-11126
Published online Oct 21, 2015. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v21.i39.11118
Hepatic differentiation of rat induced pluripotent stem cells in vitro
Chao Sun, Jun-Jie Hu, Qin Pan, Yi Cao, Jian-Gao Fan, Guang-Ming Li
Chao Sun, Qin Pan, Yi Cao, Jian-Gao Fan, Guang-Ming Li, Department of Gastroenterology, Xinhua Hospital Affiliated to Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, Shanghai 200092, China
Jun-Jie Hu, Department of Gastroenterology, Shanghai First People’s Hospital, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai 200080, China
Author contributions: Sun C performed the experiments, analyzed the data and drafted the article; Hu JJ performed the experiments; Pan Q and Cao Y analyzed the data; Fan JG supervised the study and revised the article; Li GM conceived and designed the study.
Supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China, No. 81000173, No. 81070344 and No. 81100297.
Institutional review board statement: The study did not involve human or animal subjects.
Institutional animal care and use committee statement: The study did not involve human or animal subjects.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors declare no financial conflict of interest.
Data sharing statement: No additional data are available.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Guang-Ming Li, MD, PhD, Department of Gastroenterology, Xinhua Hospital Affiliated to Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, 1665 Kongjiang Road, Shanghai 200092, China. ligm55@163.com
Telephone: +86-21-25077343 Fax: +86-21-65030840
Received: January 22, 2015
Peer-review started: January 24, 2015
First decision: April 14, 2015
Revised: April 23, 2015
Accepted: August 25, 2015
Article in press: August 25, 2015
Published online: October 21, 2015
Processing time: 269 Days and 18.6 Hours
Core Tip

Core tip: Induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) can differentiate into many kinds of cells, including hepatocytes. However, the most important animal model for studying human diseases, especially liver diseases, is the rat model. This study is the first to show the efficient generation of hepatocyte-like cells (HLCs) differentiated from the iPSCs of rats. Hepatic differentiation was achieved using a three-step protocol. Rat iPSCs were differentiated into HLCs after 20 d of culture. These differentiated cells expressed hepatic markers and exhibited functional hepatic characteristics. These differentiated cells may be an attractive resource for treatment of liver disease.