A research team lead by Professor Dong-wook Han of the Department of Stem Cell Biology, School of Medicine, succeeded in directly converting mouse fibroblasts into cholangiocyte progenitor cells. They found that the expression of Hnf1α and Foxa3 dramatically facilitates the robust generation of iHepSCs and prolonged in vitro culture of Hnf1α- and Foxa3-derived iHepSCs induces a Notch signaling-mediated secondary conversion into cholangiocyte progenitor-like cells that display dramatically enhanced differentiation capacity into mature cholangiocytes. It is expected that the technology will play a pivotal role in developing cell therapy products and new drugs for cholangiocyte-related diseases.
This research, titled “Direct Conversion of Mouse Fibroblasts into Cholangiocyte Progenitor Cells”, published in Stem Cell Reports, a monthly peer-reviewed open access journal covering research into stem cells, was supported by National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) grants funded by the Korean government (MSIP)
*This study’s co-authors include Kyung-tae Lim, MD, and Jong-hun Kim and Seon-in Hwang, PhD students at the School of Medicine.