Generation of cryopreserved macrophages from normal and genetically engineered human pluripotent stem cells for disease modelling

• Published in: PloS one 2021-04, Vol.16 (4), p.e0250107-e0250107
• Main Authors: Munn, Christie, Burton, Sarah, Dickerson, Sarah, Bakshy, Kiranmayee, Strouse, Anne, Rajesh, Deepika
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Alanine; Alveoli; Alzheimer's disease; Alzheimers disease; Basal ganglia; Biology and Life Sciences; Blood circulation; Brain diseases; Burton, Sarah; Central nervous system diseases; Cryopreservation; Diseases; Engineering and Technology; Genetic aspects; Genetic engineering; Kupffer cells; Macrophages; MeCP2 protein; Medicine and Health Sciences; Methyl-CpG binding protein; Microglia; Mimicry; Modelling; Monocytes; Movement disorders; Mutation; Nervous system; Neurodegeneration; Parkinson's disease; Parkinsons disease; Peripheral nervous system; Physiological aspects; Pluripotency; Proteins; Research and Analysis Methods; Rett syndrome; Stem cells; Synuclein; Threonine; United States
• ISSN: 1932-6203; 1932-6203
• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0250107

Macrophages are innate immune cells that play critical roles in tissue homeostasis, inflammation, and immune oncology. Macrophages differentiated from human induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) overcome many limitations of using peripheral blood derived macrophages. The ability to scale up and cryopreserve a large amount of end stage macrophages from single clonal iPSCs from normal and disease specific donors offers a unique opportunity for genomic analysis and drug screening. The present study describes the step wise generation and characterization of macrophages from iPSCs using a defined serum free method amenable to scale up to generate a large batch of pure end stage cryopreservable macrophages expressing CD68, CD33, CD11c, CD11b, CD1a, HLA-DR, CD86, CD64, CD80, CD206, CD169, CD47, HLA-ABC, and CX3CR. The end stage macrophages pre and post cryopreservation retain purity, morphology, responsiveness to stimuli and display robust phagocytic function coming right out of cryopreservation. The same differentiation process was used to generate end stage macrophages from isogenic iPSCs engineered to mimic mutations associated with Parkinson's disease (SNCA A53T), neuronal ceroid lipofuscinosis (GRN2/GRN R493X), and Rett syndrome (MECP2-Knockout). End stage macrophages from isogenic engineered clones displayed differential macrophage-specific purity markers, phagocytic function, and response to specific stimuli. Thus, generating a panel of functional, physiologically relevant iPSC-derived macrophages can potentially facilitate the understanding of neural inflammatory responses associated with neurodegeneration.