Characterization of multipotent adult stem cells from the skin: transforming growth factor-beta (TGF-beta) facilitates cell growth.

Evidence from laboratory and animal studies provides groundwork for understanding mechanisms and potential before human studies continue.

• Level A · Stronger Clinical Evidence
• Level B · Emerging clinical evidence with positive signals
• Level C · Early human research exploring benefits
• Level D · Scientific groundwork from lab and animal studies
• Emerging · Emerging topic under active research

Abstract (original English)

Recently, adult stem cells have been isolated from the skin and designated as skin-derived precursors (SKPs). These SKPs, cultured in vitro, can give rise to neurons, glia, smooth muscle cells, and adipocytes. In the current study, we confirmed the clonal expansion of SKPs using a sphere-forming culture system in a medium containing methylcellulose. Among the growth factors, only transforming growth factor-beta (TGF-beta) was revealed to uniquely facilitate the sphere formation and proliferation of the SKPs in combination with EGF and bFGF. In addition, TGF-beta did not alter phenotypical characteristics of the SKPs under sphere-forming conditions. The effect of TGF-beta on sphere formation was not observed in neural stem cells, which expressed a different set of cell surface markers from SKPs, suggesting that SKPs have distinct features. Although the number of SKPs decreased with age, TGF-beta increased the sphere colony formation and proliferation in all ages. These results suggest that SKPs maintained in the presence of TGF-beta during culture are of potential use in cell-replacement therapies employing adult tissue sources.

Evidence level

Evidence from laboratory and animal studies provides groundwork for understanding mechanisms and potential before human studies continue.

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