Person:

Bar-Nur, Ori

Summary The generation of induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) from differentiated cells following forced expression of OCT4, KLF4, SOX2, and C-MYC (OKSM) is slow and inefficient, suggesting that transcription factors have to overcome somatic barriers that resist cell fate change. Here, we performed an unbiased serial shRNA enrichment screen to identify potent repressors of somatic cell reprogramming into iPSCs. This effort uncovered the protein modifier SUMO2 as one of the strongest roadblocks to iPSC formation. Depletion of SUMO2 both enhances and accelerates reprogramming, yielding transgene-independent, chimera-competent iPSCs after as little as 38 hr of OKSM expression. We further show that the SUMO2 pathway acts independently of exogenous C-MYC expression and in parallel with small-molecule enhancers of reprogramming. Importantly, suppression of SUMO2 also promotes the generation of human iPSCs. Together, our results reveal sumoylation as a crucial post-transcriptional mechanism that resists the acquisition of pluripotency from fibroblasts using defined factors.

Brief expression of pluripotency-associated factors such as Oct4, Klf4, Sox2 and c-Myc (OKSM), in combination with differentiation-inducing signals, was reported to trigger transdifferentiation of fibroblasts into other cell types. Here we show that OKSM expression in mouse fibroblasts gives rise to both induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) and induced neural stem cells (iNSCs) under conditions previously shown to induce only iNSCs. Fibroblast-derived iNSC colonies silenced retroviral transgenes and reactivated silenced X chromosomes, both hallmarks of pluripotent stem cells. Moreover, lineage tracing with an Oct4-CreER labeling system demonstrated that virtually all iNSC colonies originated from cells transiently expressing Oct4, whereas ablation of Oct4+ cells prevented iNSC formation. Lastly, an alternative transdifferentiation cocktail that lacks Oct4 and was reportedly unable to support induced pluripotency yielded iPSCs and iNSCs carrying the Oct4-CreER-derived lineage label. Together, these data suggest that iNSC generation from fibroblasts using OKSM and other pluripotency-related reprogramming factors requires passage through a transient iPSC state.

The reprogramming of somatic cells into induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) upon overexpression of OCT4, KLF4, SOX2, and c-MYC (OKSM) provides a powerful system to interrogate basic mechanisms of cell fate change. However, iPSC formation with standard methods is protracted and inefficient, resulting in heterogeneous cell populations. Here we show that exposure of OKSM-expressing cells to both ascorbic acid and a GSK3-beta inhibitor (termed “AGi”) facilitates more synchronous and rapid iPSC formation from a variety of mouse cell types. AGi treatment restored the ability of refractory cell populations to yield iPSC colonies, and it attenuated the activation of developmental regulators commonly observed during the reprogramming process. Moreover, AGi supplementation gave rise to chimera-competent iPSCs after as little as 48 hours of OKSM expression. Our results offer a simple modification to the reprogramming protocol, facilitating iPSC induction at unparalleled efficiencies and enabling dissection of the underlying mechanisms in more homogeneous cell populations.