Generation of Human Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells Using Endothelial Progenitor Cells Derived from Umbilical Cord Blood and Adult Peripheral Blood

Induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) offer the potential to generate tissue cells with donor diversity therefore promising to have widespread applications in regenerative medicine, disease modeling, drug discovery, and toxicity testing. Several somatic cell types have been utilized, with varying efficiencies, as source cells for the reprogramming of iPSCs. Recently, it has been reported that endothelial progenitor cells (EPCs) derived from umbilical cord blood (CB) or adult peripheral blood (PB) afford a practical and efficient cellular substrate for iPSC generation, and possess several advantages over other cell types. In this chapter, we describe a protocol that covers all steps of reprogramming iPSCs from blood-derived EPCs, including (1) isolation of mononuclear cells (MNCs) from blood samples, (2) derivation of EPCs from MNCs, and (3) generation of iPSCs from EPCs. The final step of reprogramming EPCs into iPSCs is achieved through ectopic expression of four transcription factors, OCT4, KLF4, SOX2, and c-MYC, using self-replicative RNA (srRNA) technology.