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'''Induced pluripotent stem cells''' area type of [[adult stem cells]]; more specifically, they are [[stem cells]] that are derived from [[somatic cells]] by [[transfection]] with a virus.  The virus carries genes that are capable of causing the target cell to dedifferentiate and then gain the ability to differentiate into any type of cell in the body and to indefinitely propagate itself.

'''Induced pluripotent stem cells''', also known as '''iPSCs''', are pluripotent [[stem cells]] derived from [[cell differentiation|fully-differentiated]] ("adult") somatic cells.  While they are often mistakenly referred to as "[[adult stem cells]]", this is not the proper term for them because biologists more commonly use the phrase "adult stem cells" to refer to the partially-differentiated stem cells residing in somatic tissues.

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iPSCs are generated by [[transfection|transfecting]] fully differentiated cells with a combination of [[transcription factors]] that cause the cells to de-differentiate into a pluripotent state, mimicking the pluripotency of [[embryonic stem cells]].  As pluripotent cells, iPSCs can generate cells of any type; they can even be used to generate "organoids" (structures mimicking the organization of complex tissues) in-vitro (in [[cell culture|culture]]).

 

Current methods of generating iPSCs are not without limitations. While the process of inducing de-differentiation does yield pluripotent cells, these cells retain some [[epigenetics|epigenitic]] imprinting of the cell type from which they were derived. As such, iPSCs do not perfectly recapitulate the behavior of embryonic stem cells. Additionally, cell transplantation studies have demonstrated that iPSCs are significantly (~3-4 times, depending on the source tissue and method of induction) more tumorigenic in-vivo than embryonic stem cells, limiting their current therapeutic potential.

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==References==