Early passage mouse induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells derivated from various somatic cell origins

Induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells have been derived from various somatic cell populations through ectopic expression of defined factors. It remains unclear whether iPS cells generated from different cell types are molecularly and functionally similar. Here, we show that iPS cells obtained from fibroblasts, hematopoietic and myogenic cells exhibit distinct transcriptional and epigenetic patterns. Moreover, we demonstrate that cellular origin influences the in vitro differentiation potentials of iPS cells into embryoid bodies and different hematopoietic cells. Our results suggest that low-passage iPS cells retain a transient epigenetic memory of their somatic cells of origin, which manifests as differential gene expression and altered differentiation capacity. These observations might affect ongoing attempts to use iPS cells for disease modeling and also could be exploited for potential therapeutic applications to enhance differentiation into desired cell lineages. This series consists of triplicated mRNA expression microarray data (Affymetrix mouse gene ST 1.0) for an early passage (passage 4) of mouse iPS cells derived from bone marrow granulocytes, splenic B cells, tail tip fibroblasts, and skeletel muscle precursor cells.