The Stem Cell Core offers the following services:

Reprogramming

The Stem Cell Core at QBRI has expertise in generation of human and non-human primate induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) and their karyotypic and pluripotency characterization and banking.

Genome Engineering

The core also provides genome engineering services to create isogenic human pluripotent stem cells (hPSCs) lines as well as gene knockout/in via CRISPR/Cas9, TALENs, recombinases and transposases. Furthermore, retro and lenti viruses can be designed and packaged for various applications.

Assays for quality control

The following assays are offered for pluripotent stem cells and other cell types:

• Pluripotency FLOW analysis OR Immunocytochemistry
• Three germ layer differentiation Immunocytochemistry OR FLOW analysis
• Short Tandem Repeat (STR) Analysis
• G banding karyotyping
• Master and Working cell banks

Control iPSC lines

The core will generate control iPSC lines from dermal fibroblast and CD34+ hematopoietic stem cells from healthy male and female donor samples. These iPSC lines are fully characterized for pluripotency, karyotyped and banked. These lines will be available for researchers to use as control lines for their experiments.

Directed Differentiations

The core has expertise in directed differentiation of hPSCs into cortical neurons and directed differentiation of pancreatic progenitor and insulin producing functional beta cells from hPSCs. The core can also provide control (WT) neural precursor cells and pancreatic progenitor cells for directed differentiations into neurons and beta cells respectively.

Training and Collaboration

Furthermore, the core is responsible for training and teaching of scientific staff in pluripotent stem cell maintenance and trouble shooting with directed differentiation protocols.