Induced pluripotent stem cell-based therapies for organ fibrosis

Wei Cheng; Chengming Fan; Qing Song; Ping Chen; Hong Peng; Ling Lin; Cong Liu; Bin Wang; Zijing Zhou

doi:10.3389/fbioe.2023.1119606

Induced pluripotent stem cell-based therapies for organ fibrosis

Front Bioeng Biotechnol. 2023 May 18:11:1119606. doi: 10.3389/fbioe.2023.1119606. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Wei Cheng^{1

2}, Chengming Fan³, Qing Song^{1

2}, Ping Chen^{1

2}, Hong Peng^{1

2}, Ling Lin^{1

2}, Cong Liu^{1

2}, Bin Wang⁴, Zijing Zhou^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine, Second Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha, China.
² Research Unit of Respiratory Disease, Central South University, Changsha, China.
³ Department of Cardiovascular Surgery, Second Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha, China.
⁴ Department of Thoracic Surgery, Second Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha, China.

Abstract

Fibrotic diseases result in organ remodelling and dysfunctional failure and account for one-third of all deaths worldwide. There are no ideal treatments that can halt or reverse progressive organ fibrosis, moreover, organ transplantation is complicated by problems with a limited supply of donor organs and graft rejection. The development of new approaches, especially induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC)-based therapy, is becoming a hot topic due to their ability to self-renew and differentiate into different cell types that may replace the fibrotic organs. In the past decade, studies have differentiated iPSCs into fibrosis-relevant cell types which were demonstrated to have anti-fibrotic effects that may have the potential to inform new effective precision treatments for organ-specific fibrosis. In this review, we summarize the potential of iPSC-based cellular approaches as therapeutic avenues for treating organ fibrosis, the advantages and disadvantages of iPSCs compared with other types of stem cell-based therapies, as well as the challenges and future outlook in this field.

Keywords: cell therapy; fibrosis; human induced pluripotent stem cells (hiPSC); induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSC); stem cell.

Publication types

Review

Grants and funding

This work was supported by the Scientific Research Launch Project for new employees of the Second Xiangya Hospital of Central South University and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC, Grants 82100082 and 81970044).