Derivation of human salivary epithelial progenitors from pluripotent stem cells

We described, for the first time, a robust protocol for direct differentiation of hPSCs into SGEP by mimicking the activity of retinoic acid and WNT signaling. These hPSC-derived SGEP expressed SOX9, KRT5 and KRT19, which were the important progenitor markers of developing salivary glands. The CD24 and α-SMA positive cells that are capable to restore the function of injured salivary glands were also present in SGEP cultures. Importantly, RNA-seq was performed to examine the similarity of SGEP to human fetal and mature salivary glands. The result revealed the SGEP resemble the transcript profile of human fetal submandibular glands. Therefore, we successfully induced hPSCs into SGEP and demonstrated that these SGEP potentially serves as models for studying mechanism underling salivary development, and as cell sources for clinical use. Analysis of global transcriptomes of human embryonic stem cell (H1) derived salivary gland epithelial progenitors.There are two  replicates. Control group are published RNA-seq datasets.