Response of Pluripotent Stem Cells to Environmental Stresses

Dear Colleagues,

In pluripotent stem cells (PSCs) as embryonic and induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs), the characteristics as epigenetic state, gene expression profiles, and the cellular localization of  proteins are quite different from differentiated and somatic cells. Due to such differences, the response to environmental stimuli and stresses as hypoxic, heat, and oxidative stress and chemicals, some ligands of channels and receptors etc is also different between PSCs and differentiated cells. For example, PSCs are highly sensitive to proteotoxic stress by MG132 and the levels of stress-responsive transcription factors change during differentiation.

In this special issue, we would like to focus on such difference and the mechanism of it. By clarifying it, we can know the characteristics of stress response of PSCs and set up the differentiation protocol to somatic tissues by considering it. Furthermore, it could serve an useful information for the research on toxicology of chemicals in embryos and on iPSC-derived stress-related disease model like neurodegenerative diseases.

In this special issue, we invite the original research articles and reviews on the following subjects: (1) the molecular mechanism of the response to any stresses in stem cells; (2) the implication of stress response in stemness and differentiation; (3) iPSC-derived stress-ralated disease models and their stress response; (4) toxicology in embryonic stem cells.

Dr. Taku Kaitsuka
Guest Editor

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