Adult human retinal pigment epithelial cells capable of differentiating into neurons

Abstract

We investigated the ability of adult human RPE cells to differentiate into neurons. Two cell lines were evaluated. The cells were cultured in medium with 8% serum, transferred to a neural stem cell maintenance culture, and induced to differentiate with retinoic acid. The cells were immunocytochemically examined at each step. The cells showed epithelial-like morphology with 8% serum and all were immunoreactive for beta-III tubulin. After transfer to the stem cell maintenance culture, they changed morphologically and became immunoreactive for MAP5 and neurofilament200 after inducement with retinoic acid. The ratio of MAP5 positive cells was higher in the young adult RPE cell line. No GFAP or rod-opsin immunoreactive cells were observed. Adult human RPE cells even from old person are capable of differentiating into neurons, although the ratio of mature neurons was greater in the young than in the old cell line in this condition.

Phenotypic Plasticity of Retinal Pigment Epithelial Cells from Adult Human Eye In Vitro

“…Cell proliferation was accompanied by their depigmentation and expression of differentiation features not characteristic of RPE. This phenomenon was confi rmed by the results of other researchers [2,16,19,23]. Expression of βIII-tubulin attests to cell ability to neuronal differentiation, but under the specifi ed culturing conditions this capacity was preserved only before passage 3.…”

In Vitro Phenotypic Modifi cation of Pigmented Epithelium Cells from Human Eye at Early Stages of Development

“…In human PE cells, the processes similar to transdifferentiation were fi rst detected in eye diseases in volving active proliferation, migration, and depigmentation of cells, which start expressing atypical markers [2]. Mosaicism of PE [4] suggests that these pathological events are mediated by activation of cells with multipotent characteristics; changes in these cells are similar to transdifferentiation processes in lower vertebrates.…”

Current Advancements in the Development and Characterization of Full-Thickness Adult Neuroretina Organotypic Culture Systems

“…The use of the immortalized mouse photoreceptor cell line 661W [Tan et al, 2004;Al-Ubaidi et al, 2008;Thompson et al, 2015;Sayyad et al, 2017] and the human Müller cell line MIO-M1 [Limb et al, 2002;Hollborn et al, 2011] has also been described in the literature. Human RPE cell lines such as ARPE-19, D407, H80HrPE, and hTERT RPE-1 [Davis et al, 1995;Dunn et al, 1996;Amemiya et al, 2004;Constable et al, 2006;Yan et al, 2013;Samuel et al, 2017] are also available, in addition to a rat RPE cell line RPE-J [Nabi et al, 1993;West et al, 2001] and mouse RPE cell line B6-RPE07 [Chen et al, 2008]. Unfortunately, immortalized cell lines often differ genetically and phenotypically from their tissue of origin.…”