Finger-prick iPSCs Facilitate the Development of Stem cell banking

Induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) derived from somatic cells of patients can be a good model for studying human diseases and for future therapeutic regenerative medicine. Current initiatives to establish iPSC banking face challenges in recruiting large numbers of donors with diverse diseased, genetic and phenotypic representations. Here, we describe the derivation of transgene-free iPSCs from human finger-prick blood. Fingerprick samples collection can be performed “DIY (Do-it-yourself)” by donors and sent to the iPSC facility for reprogramming. We show that single drop volumes of finger-prick samples are sufficient for performing cellular reprogramming, DNA sequencing and blood serotyping in parallel. Our novel strategy will facilitate the development of large scale iPSC banking world-wide. Total RNA from PBMC, hES cells, or iPS cells from PBMC was labeled with biotin. Samples were hybridized to HumanHT-12v4 Beadchip (Illumina) according to manufacturer’s protocol.