Human disease models
Use of patient specific iPSC for studying human neural crest development and disease etiology for Hirschsprung disease
Early stages of human gestation are virtually inaccessible for experimental research, making human induced pluriopotent stem cell (iPSC) culture a unique model for studying the development of human NC lineages and the associated diseases. To date, with defined differentiation conditions, iPSC can be dictated to form neural rosettes that comprise cells expressing early neuroectodermal markers.  Importantly, in response to appropriate developmental patterning cues, these neuroepithium-like cells are capable of progressing toward different NC lineages and differentiating into varied region-specific neural and non-neural NC derivatives.
