细胞重编程改写细胞命运:细胞的返老还童——2012年诺贝尔生理学或医学奖简介

Cell Fate Changed by Reprogramming: the Rejuvenation of Cells——A Brief Introduction to the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2012

科学家们对细胞重编程的研究已经持续了数十年。所谓细胞重编程是指"已分化的特定细胞可以被重新编程为多功能的干细胞"。1962年,约翰.戈登(John Gurdon)在他的实验室里证明,已分化的动物体细胞在蛙卵中可以被重编程,从而具有发育成完整个体的能力,证明了细胞的分化是可逆的。2006年,山中伸弥(Shinya Yamanaka)将戈登的这一成果推进了一大步,实现了细胞在体外的重编程,诱导出了具有多能性的细胞(即诱导性多能干细胞,in-duced pluripotent stem cell,iPS细胞),证明了细胞命运是有选择性地打开或关闭某些基因的结果。与胚胎干细胞相比,iPS细胞的优势在于它避开了使用人体胚胎提取干细胞的伦理道德制约,使干细胞研究能被所有人接受。同时,由于这些细胞来自于病人自身,在临床应用时有希望避免免疫系统对外来组织的排斥。iPS技术的创立开创了一个全新的研究领域。

The study of cell reprogramming has been carried out by many scientists for decades of years. The term cell reprogramming means ＂fully differentiated cells can be reprogrammed to multipotent stem cells＂. In 1962, John Gurdon proved that somatic cells can be reprogrammed in an unfertilized enucleated Xenopus egg, demonstrating that nuclei from specialized cells still held the potential to be any cell type despite its specialization. Based on Gurdon＇s achievement, in 2006, Shinya Yamanaka made great progress in the cell reprogramming field. He successfully performed cell repro- gramming outside the body and obtained cells with multipotency, namely induced pluripotent stem cells （iPS cells ）, indicating that cell fate is determined by selectively opening or closing some certain genes. Compared with embryo stem cells （ES cells）, iPS has great superiority in avoiding ethical troubles caused by collecting stem cells from human embryo. Moreover, the cells derived from pa- tients~ own tissues are most likely to eliminate immune rejection problems in clinical application. The establishment of iPS technique has triggered the beginning of a brand new research field.