With the ability to be coaxed into different kinds of mature cell types, induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) hold all kinds of potential in the world of regenerative medicine. One of the many possibilities could be repairing damaged hearts, something that will soon be put to the test for the first time ever in newly approved clinical trials in Japan.
Since emerging from the laboratory of researcher Shinya Yamanaka in Japan in 2006, the potential of iPSCs has been explored in all kinds of promising research efforts. We have seen them implanted into rabbits to restore their vision, become brain tumor predators, and turned into precursor cells for human organs.
IPSCs are created by first harvesting cells from body tissues and then infecting them with a virus, in turn introducing them to carefully selected genes that return them to their immature state. From there they can develop into any cell in the body, a capability so powerful it earned Yamanaka a Nobel Prize in 2012.
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