Differentiation of embryonic stem cells into cartilage cells

Embryonic stem (ES) cells have complete potential to form all types of cells. Although these cells have indefinite capacity for self-renewal, the mechanisms that control their lineage-restricted differentiation are not well understood. Due to their potential to form all types of cells, these cells are expected to have applications in regenerative medicine to cure human diseases. Osteoarthritis (OA) is a degenerative disease of articular cartilage of weight bearing joints. Approximately twenty million people suffer from this debilitating disease. Therefore, the induced differentiation of ES cells into cartilage-producing cells will have potential application to cure OA. This unit describes a system to induce differentiation of a high percentage of ES cells into mesenchymal cells that differentiate into chondrocytes, the cartilage-producing cells. A quantitative production of chondrocytes can be a powerful resource to alleviate the suffering of those patients with OA. Furthermore, this can be an excellent system to investigate the upstream events of cell-restricted differentiation during the inaccessible period of development.