Human-Induced Pluripotent Stem Cell-Derived Definitive Endoderm Bulk Up and Hepatic Differentiation.

We have developed a method to bulk up definitive endoderm cells generated from human iPSC, and can be further differentiated to hepatocytes. Human iPSC-derived definitive endoderm cells were sorted, based on the expression of CXCR4, and were able to proliferate for extended periods and can be cryopreserved. These cells were able to generate functional hepatocytes expressing albumin and alpha-fetoprotein in different multi-well formats. This method would help to produce more consistent hepatocytes and also enable the development of high throughput screening strategies.