Human induced pluripotent stem cells derived neutrophils display strong anti-microbial potencies

Neutrophils are essential innate immune cells with unusual anti-microbial properties while dysfunctions of neutrophils lead to severe health problems such as lethal infections. Generation of neutrophils from human induced pluripotent stem cells (hiPSCs) is highly promising to produce off-the-shelf neutrophils for transfusion therapies. However, the anti-microbial potencies of hiPSCs derived neutrophils (iNEUs) remain less documented. Here, we develop a scalable approach to generate iNEUs in a chemical defined condition. iNEUs display typical neutrophil characters in terms of phagocytosis, migration, formation of neutrophil extracellular traps (NETs), etc. Importantly, iNEUs display a strong killing potency against various bacteria such as K.pneumoniae, P.aeruginosa, E.coli and S.aureus. Moreover, transfusions of iNEUs in mice with neutrophil dysfunction largely enhance their survival in lethal infection of different bacteria. Together, our data show that hiPSCs derived neutrophils hold strong anti-microbial potencies to protect severe infections under neutrophil dysfunction conditions.