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Mouse and human pluripotent stem cells, with properties that are similar to embryonic stem cells (ESCs), can be created by introducing four genes into adult cells. This landmark discovery suggested that powerful human stem-cell therapy might be possible without immune rejection or ethical issues associated with using fetal tissues (JW Nov 29 2007). However, one of the required four genes was an oncogene, c-Myc, which has limited use of this technique in humans.
A team from Germany now reports that neural stem cells in mice can be reprogrammed to become pluripotent stem cells by introducing just two genes, Oct4 and Klf4, neither of which is an oncogene. The reprogrammed pluripotent cells have the same gene-expression signature as ESCs, and be…