Vallier Ludovic
Department of Surgery and Cambridge Institute for Medical Research, Addenbrooke's Hospital, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK.
Methods Mol Biol. 2011;690:57-66. doi: 10.1007/978-1-60761-962-8_3.
Human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) are pluripotent cells derived from the embryo at the blastocyst stage. Their embryonic origin confers upon them the capacity to proliferate indefinitely in vitro while maintaining the capacity to differentiate into a large variety of cell types. Based on these properties of self-renewal and pluripotency, hESCs represent a unique source to generate a large quantity of certain specialized cell types with clinical interest for transplantation-based therapy. However, hESCs are usually grown in culture conditions using fetal bovine serum and mouse embryonic fibroblasts, two components that are not compatible with clinical applications. Consequently, the possibility to expand hESCs in serum-free and in feeder-free culture conditions is becoming a major challenge to deliver the clinical promises of hESCs. Here, we describe the basic principles of growing hESCs in a chemically defined medium (CDM) devoid of serum and feeders.
人类胚胎干细胞（hESCs）是源自囊胚期胚胎的多能细胞。其胚胎起源赋予它们在体外无限增殖的能力，同时保持分化为多种细胞类型的能力。基于自我更新和多能性的这些特性，hESCs是产生大量具有临床移植治疗意义的特定专门细胞类型的独特来源。然而，hESCs通常在使用胎牛血清和小鼠胚胎成纤维细胞的培养条件下生长，这两种成分与临床应用不兼容。因此，在无血清和无饲养层培养条件下扩增hESCs的可能性正成为实现hESCs临床应用前景的一项重大挑战。在此，我们描述了在不含血清和饲养层的化学限定培养基（CDM）中培养hESCs的基本原理。
