Comparison of two types of non-adherent plate for neuronal differentiation of mouse embryonic stem cells

Biomimetic polymers with phosphorylcholine groups as biomaterials for medical devices

Biomimetic molecular designs can yield superior biomaterials. Polymers with a phosphorylcholine group, a polar group of phospholipid molecules, are particularly interesting. A methacrylate monomer, 2-methacryloyloxyethyl phosphorylcholine (MPC), was developed using efficient synthetic reactions and purification techniques. This process has been applied in industrial production to supply MPC globally. Polymers with various structures can be readily synthesized using MPC and their properties have been studied. The MPC polymer surface has a highly hydrated structure in biological conditions, leading to the prevention of adsorption of proteins and lipid molecules, adhesion of cells, and inhibition of bacterial adhesion and biofilm formation. Additionally, it provides an extremely lubricious surface. MPC polymers are used in various applications and can be stably immobilized on material surfaces such as metals and ceramics and polymers such as elastomers. They are also stable under sterilization and in vivo conditions. This makes them ideal for application in the surface treatment of various medical devices, including artificial organs, implanted in humans.

Markers associated with neuron-specific Ube3a imprinting during neuronal differentiation of mouse embryonic stem cells

Understanding gene expression in the brain requires allele-specific transcriptome analysis because of the presence of neuron-specific imprinted genes, which are expressed in a neuron-specific and parent-of-origin-specific manner. Ube3a is a neuron-specific imprinted gene with an expression pattern that changes from biallelic to maternal only (Ube3a imprinting) during differentiation. Because Ube3a imprinting occurs only in neurons, it has the potential to be a marker to assess the quality of neurons produced by in vitro neuronal differentiation of embryonic stem cells (ESCs). For the analysis of Ube3a imprinting, genetic polymorphisms between the two alleles are necessary to identify the parental origin of each. However, ESCs derived from commonly used inbred mouse strains have no genetic polymorphisms. To overcome this problem, we examined 10 markers of neurogenesis to determine whether they were associated with Ube3a imprinting. We measured the relative expression levels of these 10 gene markers and assessed the Ube3a imprinting status of 54 neuron samples differentiated under various in vitro conditions. Then we divided the samples into two groups depending on their Ube3a imprinting status and selected markers statistically associated with Ube3a imprinting. The identified markers included the antisense noncoding transcript of Ube3a and a mature neuron marker Mtap2, consistent with the markers we used empirically in our previous study to assess the quality of differentiated neurons. These findings provide new quality control criteria for differentiated neurons, and could also be applied to human ESCs and induced pluripotent stem cells.