Myogenic Progenitors from Mouse Pluripotent Stem Cells for Muscle Regeneration

Muscle homeostasis is maintained by resident stem cells which, in both pathologic and non-pathologic conditions, are able to repair or generate new muscle fibers. Although muscle stem cells have tremendous regenerative potential, their application in cell therapy protocols is prevented by several restrictions, including the limited ability to grow ex vivo. Since pluripotent stem cells have the unique potential to both self-renew and expand almost indefinitely, they have become an attractive source of progenitors for regenerative medicine studies. Our lab has demonstrated that embryonic stem cell (ES)-derived myogenic progenitors retain the ability to repair existing muscle fibers and contribute to the pool of resident stem cells. Because of their relevance in both cell therapy and disease modeling, in this chapter we describe the protocol to derive myogenic progenitors from murine ES cells followed by their intramuscular delivery in a murine muscular dystrophy model.