title: Current state of the opportunities for derivation of germ-like cells from pluripotent stem cells: are you a man, or a mouse?
abstract: The concept of pluripotency as a prerogative of cells of early mammal embryos and cultured embryonic stem cells (ESC) has been invalidated with the advent of induced pluripotent stem cells. Later, it became clear that the ability to generate all cell types of the adult organism is also a questionable aspect of pluripotency, as there are cell types, such as germ cells, which are difficult to produce from pluripotent stem cells. Recently it has been proposed that there are at least two different states of pluripotency; namely, the naïve, or ground state, and the primed state, which may differ radically in terms of timeline of existence, signalling mechanisms, cell properties, capacity for differentiation into different cell types, etc. Germ-like male and female rodent cells have been successfully producedin vitrofrom ESC and induced pluripotent stem cells. The attempts to derive primate primordial germ cells (PGC) and germ cellsin vitrofrom pluripotent stem cells, however, still have a low success rate, especially with the female germline. The paper reviews the properties of rodent and primate ESC with regard to their capacity for differentiationin vitroto germ-like cells, outlining the possible caveats to derivation of PGC and germ cells from primate and human pluripotent cells.
authors.affiliation: Scientific Technological Service (STS) Ltd. , Sofia , Bulgaria.
authors.forename: Rumena
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Petkova
authors.affiliation: Scientific Technological Service (STS) Ltd. , Sofia , Bulgaria ; Department of Cell Biology, Histology and Embryology, and Department of Biochemistry, Faculty of Biology, Sofia University 'St. Kliment Ohridsky' , Sofia , Bulgaria.
authors.forename: Borislav
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Arabadjiev
authors.affiliation: Department of Cell Biology, Histology and Embryology, and Department of Biochemistry, Faculty of Biology, Sofia University 'St. Kliment Ohridsky' , Sofia , Bulgaria.
authors.forename: Stoyan
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Chakarov
authors.affiliation: Department of Cell Biology, Histology and Embryology, and Department of Biochemistry, Faculty of Biology, Sofia University 'St. Kliment Ohridsky' , Sofia , Bulgaria.
authors.forename: Roumen
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Pankov
keywords: PGC; germ cells; ground state; hESC; mESC; pluripotency