Endocrine Abstracts

Embryonic stem (ES) cells are pluripotent stem cells derived from a developmental stage of preimplanted embryos. In this study, we investigated the effect of female sex steroid hormones on the characteristics of human ES cells by using a feeder-free culture protocol. In a feeder-free condition without sex hormones, human ES cells assumed the form of tightly packed cells that grow in a monolayer. The cells also displayed clean and defined edges with no evidence of differentiation and expressed several markers specific for undifferentiated ES cells such as POU5F1, SOX2, and NANOG. Next, we investigated whether female sex steroid hormones such as 17β-estradiol (E2) and progesterone (P4) could alter the protein expression of epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) related markers as well as pluripotency markers such as POU5F1, SOX2, and NANOG in human ES cells. The protein expressions of N-cadherin, SNAI1, and SNAI2 were increased while E-cadherin expression was decreased by treatment of E2 or P4 and that the expressions of POU5F1, SOX2, and NANOG were decreased by the treatment of E2 or P4. When E2 and P4 were treated in the combination with estrogen receptor inhibitor (ICI 182,780) and progesterone receptor inhibitor (RU486), respectively, their effects on EMT and pluripotency of ES cells were restored to the control levels. Collectively, these results suggest that E2 and P4 may regulate EMT and pluripotency of human ES cells by mediating their receptors. The present study might be useful to understand the roles of sex steroid hormones in cellular biology of human ES cells. (This research was supported by a grant from the Next-Generation BioGreen 21 Program (no. PJ011355-2015), Rural Development Administration, Republic of Korea.)

Keywords: sex steroid hormones, human embryonic stem cells, pluripotency, epithelial-mesenchymal transition