【演者】 Ralf Jauch 先生（Associate Professor, School of Biomedical Sciences of HKUMed）【演題】The directed and natural evolution of the molecular toolkit of stem cells

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日時：令和6年8月29日（木）17:00-18:00 要旨：Our team uses re-designed versions of SOX, OCT, and KLF transcription factors to reprogram somatic cells to induce multipotent, pluripotent, and expanded potential stem cells. We discovered factors with modified partnerships, new functions, and drastically boosted activity via directed molecular evolution in mammalian cells. For example, re-engineered SOX17 turns into an enhanced 'ultra-SOX', termed eSOX17, which speeds up pluripotency induction. In human cells, eSOX17 enables the direct conversion of somatic cells into cells with totipotency features. Two-factor eSOX17/c-MYC cocktails can directly transdifferentiate human blood into induced brain stem cells, avoiding the rejuvenation associated with pluripotency induction. These potentially ‘old’ stem cells open up possibilities to model and revert age-linked neurological pathologies that are hidden in ‘young’ cells derived from pluripotent stem cells. More recently, we have begun to study the evolutionary history of stem cell factors. Until now, SOX and OCT factors have been believed to be unique to animals. Surprisingly, we discovered that one component of the molecular toolkit essential for mammalian pluripotency emerged long before the evolution of animal multicellularity and the existence of stem cells as we know them today whilst the other required further evolutionary adaptation.