title: Equivalency of nuclear transfer-derived embryonic stem cells to those derived from fertilized mouse blastocysts.
abstract: Therapeutic cloning, whereby nuclear transfer (NT) is used to generate embryonic stem cells (ESCs) from blastocysts, has been demonstrated successfully in mice and cattle. However, if NT-ESCs have abnormalities, such as those associated with the offspring produced by reproductive cloning, their scientific and medical utilities might prove limited. To evaluate the characteristics of NT-ESCs, we established more than 150 NT-ESC lines from adult somatic cells of several mouse strains. Here, we show that these NT-ESCs were able to differentiate into all functional embryonic tissues in vivo. Moreover, they were identical to blastocyst-derived ESCs in terms of their expression of pluripotency markers in the presence of tissue-dependent differentially DNA methylated regions, in DNA microarray profiles, and in high-coverage gene expression profiling. Importantly, the NT procedure did not cause irreversible damage to the nuclei. These similarities of NT-ESCs and ESCs indicate that murine therapeutic cloning by somatic cell NT can provide a reliable model for preclinical stem cell research.
authors.affiliation: Laboratory for Genomic Programming, RIKEN Center for Developmental Biology, Kobe, Japan.
authors.forename: Sayaka
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Wakayama
authors.forename: Martin L
authors.initials: ML
authors.lastname: Jakt
authors.forename: Masako
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Suzuki
authors.forename: Ryoko
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Araki
authors.forename: Takafusa
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Hikichi
authors.forename: Satoshi
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Kishigami
authors.forename: Hiroshi
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Ohta
authors.forename: Nguyen
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Van Thuan
authors.forename: Eiji
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Mizutani
authors.forename: Yuko
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Sakaide
authors.forename: Sho
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Senda
authors.forename: Satoshi
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Tanaka
authors.forename: Mitsuhiro
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Okada
authors.forename: Masashi
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Miyake
authors.forename: Masumi
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Abe
authors.forename: Shin-Ichi
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Nishikawa
authors.forename: Kunio
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Shiota
authors.forename: Teruhiko
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Wakayama
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001755:Blastocyst / Q000166:cytology / Q000378:metabolism*; D002417:Cattle; D002454:Cell Differentiation; D002467:Cell Nucleus / Q000378:metabolism*; D019175:DNA Methylation; D004622:Embryo, Mammalian / Q000166:cytology*; D005260:Female; D005306:Fertilization / Q000502:physiology*; D020869:Gene Expression Profiling; D007621:Karyotyping; D051379:Mice; D008807:Mice, Inbred BALB C; D008822:Mice, Transgenic; D046228:Microarray Analysis; D039904:Pluripotent Stem Cells / Q000166:cytology*; D035845:Research Embryo Creation