Hair & skin derived progenitor cells: In search of a candidate cell for regenerative medicine.
OBJECTIVE
Skin is an established tissue source for cell based therapy. The hair follicle has been introduced later as a tissue source for cell based therapy. The ease of tissue harvest and multipotent nature of the resident stem cells in skin and hair follicle has promoted basic and clinical research in this area. This study was conducted to evaluate skin stem cells (SSCs) and hair follicle stem cells (HFSCs) as candidate cells appropriate for neuronal and melanocyte lineage differentiation.


METHODS
In this study, SSCs and hair follicle stem cells (HFSCs) were expanded in vitro by explant culture method and were compared in terms of proliferative potential and stemness; differentiation potential into melanocytes and neuronal lineage.


RESULTS
SSCs were found to be more proliferative in comparison to HFSCs, however, telomerase activity was more in HFSCs in comparison to SSCs. Capacity to differentiate into two lineages of ectoderm origin (neuronal and melanocyte) was found to be different. HFSCs cells showed more propensities towards melanocyte lineage, whereas SSCs were more inclined towards neuronal lineage.


CONCLUSIONS
The study showed that SSCs had differential advantage over the HFSCs for neuronal cell differentiation, whereas, the HFSCs were better source for melanocytic differentiation.
Anil
A
Kumar
Stem Cell Facility, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi, India.
Sujata
S
Mohanty
Sushmita Bose
SB
Nandy
Somesh
S
Gupta
Binod K
BK
Khaitan
Shilpa
S
Sharma
Balram
B
Bhargava
Balram
B
Airan
D002454:Cell Differentiation / Q000235:genetics*; D019070:Cell Lineage / Q000235:genetics; D064987:Cell- and Tissue-Based Therapy / Q000379:methods; D018859:Hair Follicle / Q000166:cytology*; D006801:Humans; D008544:Melanocytes / Q000166:cytology; D044968:Regenerative Medicine; D012867:Skin / Q000166:cytology*; D057905:Stem Cell Research; D013234:Stem Cells / Q000166:cytology*