Germ cell and embryonic stem cells are inextricably linked in many aspects. Remarkably both can generate all somatic cell types in organisms. Yet the molecular regulation accounting for these similarities is not fully understood. Cyclin K was previously thought to associate with CDK9 to regulate gene expression. However, we and others have recently shown that its cognate interacting partners ar...

Understanding the mechanisms that regulate germ-cell development is crucial to reproductive medicine and animal production. Animal gametes originally derive from sexually undifferentiated primordial germ cells (PGCs), which develop into mitotic germ cells (oogonia or spermatogonia) before proceeding to meiosis [Wylie, C. (1999) Cell 96, 165-174]. Spermatogonia are thought to include a populatio...

stem cell therapy is a powerful technique for the treatment of a number of diseases. stem cells are derived from different tissue sources, the most important of which are the bone marrow (bm), umbilical cord (uc) blood and liver. human uc mesenchymal stem cells (huc-mscs) are multipotent, non-hematopoietic stem cells that have the ability to self-renew and differentiate into other cells and tis...

germline and somatic stem cells are distinct types of stem cells that are dedicated to reproduction and somatic tissue regeneration, respectively. germline stem cells (gscs), which can self-renew and generate gametes, are unique stem cells in that they are solely dedicated to transmit genetic information from generation to generation. we developed a strategy for the establishment of germline st...

Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is a disruption in the brain functions following a head trauma. Cell therapy may provide a promising treatment for TBI. Human neural stem cells cultured in self-assembling peptide scaffolds have been proposed as a potential novel method for cell replacement treatment after TBI. In the present study, we accessed the effects of human neural stem/progenitor cells (hNS/...

Induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) are reprogrammed from somatic cells through numerous transcription factors. Human induced pluripotent stem cell approaches are developing as a hopeful strategy to improve our knowledge of genetic association studies and the underlying molecular mechanisms.  Rapid progression in stem cell therapy and cell reprogramming provides compelling reasons for its fe...

conclusions large amounts of preclinical studies have been made of stem cells and there is an increasing interest to perform these studies within the human population but preclinical studies are insufficient; therefore, much more and efficient studies should be conducted to evaluate the efficacy and safety of stem cells. context musculoskeletal injuries may be painful, troublesome, life limitin...

stem cell therapy can be useful for spinal cord injury (sci). induced pluripotent stem cells (ipscs) are generated by reprogramming mature, fully differentiated cells into a pluripotent state. the ability to generate pluripotent cells from adult somatic cells without the need for an embryo was a major development in stem cell biology. ipscs were established from mouse fibroblasts and demonstrat...

INTRODUCTION Patients faced with infertility due to spermatogonial stem cell loss have currently semen cryobanking as only option for fertility preservation. A growing group of patients cannot benefit from this strategy as they are devoid of spermatozoa or even of any spermatogenic cell at the time of diagnosis. We therefore aimed at investigating alternative strategies to preserve or restore f...