Testosterone improves the differentiation efficiency of insulin-producing cells from human induced pluripotent stem cells

PLoS One. 2017 Jun 8;12(6):e0179353. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0179353. eCollection 2017.

Abstract

Human induced pluripotent stem cells (hiPSCs) may provide potential resource for regenerative medicine research, including generation of insulin-producing cells for diabetes research and insulin production. Testosterone (T) is an androgen hormone which promotes protein synthesis and improves the management of type 2 diabetes in clinical studies. Concurrently, co-existed hyperandrogenism and hyperinsulinism is frequently observed in polycystic ovary syndrome, congenital adrenal hyperplasia and some of Wermer's syndrome. However, the relationship among androgens, insulin and the differentiation of pancreatic β cells is still not fully clear. Here we find that T improves the differentiation efficiency of insulin-producing cells from hiPSCs. The addition of T into routine differentiation formula for pancreatic β cells increases the differentiation efficiency from 12% to 35%. The administration of T promotes the expression of key genes associated with β cells differentiation including NGN3, NEUROD1 and INS. This finding benefits the ongoing process to optimize the differentiation protocol of pancreatic β cells from hiPSCs, and provides some degree of understanding the clinical management of T for type 2 diabetes.

MeSH terms

  • Cell Differentiation / drug effects*
  • Cell Lineage / drug effects
  • Cell Lineage / genetics
  • Gene Expression Regulation / drug effects
  • Humans
  • Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells / cytology*
  • Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells / drug effects
  • Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells / metabolism
  • Insulin / metabolism
  • Insulin Secretion
  • Insulin-Secreting Cells / cytology*
  • Insulin-Secreting Cells / drug effects
  • Insulin-Secreting Cells / metabolism
  • Male
  • Multiple Endocrine Neoplasia Type 1 / metabolism
  • Multiple Endocrine Neoplasia Type 1 / pathology
  • Testosterone / pharmacology*

Substances

  • Insulin
  • Testosterone

Grants and funding

This work was financially supported by Thousand Talents Program (ODCCC2268, Yin-xiong Li), the Ministry of Science and Technology 973 Program (2015CB964700) and the Guangdong Province Science and Technology Plan (2014B020225004, 2015B020230007, 2016B030301007), Haizhu District Science and Technology Plan (2011-ZD-02, 2014-CG-05). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.