Human Induced Pluripotent Stem Cell Derived Neuronal Cells Cultured on Chemically-Defined Hydrogels for Sensitive In Vitro Detection of Botulinum Neurotoxin

• Published in: Scientific reports Vol. 5; no. 1; p. 14566
• Main Authors: Pellett, Sabine, Schwartz, Michael P., Tepp, William H., Josephson, Richard, Scherf, Jacob M., Pier, Christina L., Thomson, James A., Murphy, William L., Johnson, Eric A.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Nature Publishing Group UK 28.09.2015; Nature Publishing Group
• Subjects: 13; 13/106; 13/107; 631/136/1425; 631/378/368/2430; 631/532/2064/2158; 692/308/1426; 692/308/2171; Animals; Bioassays; Botulinum toxin; Botulinum Toxins - pharmacology; Botulinum Toxins, Type A - pharmacology; Cell culture; Cell Differentiation - drug effects; Cells, Cultured; Drug Discovery - methods; Drug Evaluation, Preclinical - methods; Humanities and Social Sciences; Humans; Hydrogels; Hydrogels - chemistry; Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells - cytology; Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells - drug effects; Mice; multidisciplinary; Neural stem cells; Neurons - cytology; Neurons - drug effects; Neurotoxicity; Neurotoxins; Pluripotency; Polyethylene glycol; Polyethylene Glycols - chemistry; Polystyrene; Science; Stem cell transplantation; Stem cells; Tissue culture
• ISSN: 2045-2322; 2045-2322
• DOI: 10.1038/srep14566

Botulinum neurotoxin (BoNT) detection provides a useful model for validating cell-based neurotoxicity screening approaches, as sensitivity is dependent on functionally competent neurons and clear quantitative endpoints are available for correlating results to approved animal testing protocols. Here, human induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC)-derived neuronal cells were cultured on chemically-defined poly(ethylene glycol) (PEG) hydrogels formed by “thiol-ene” photopolymerization and tested as a cell-based neurotoxicity assay by determining sensitivity to active BoNT/A1. BoNT/A1 sensitivity was comparable to the approved in vivo mouse bioassay for human iPSC-derived neurons and neural stem cells (iPSC-NSCs) cultured on PEG hydrogels or treated tissue culture polystyrene (TCP) surfaces. However, maximum sensitivity for BoNT detection was achieved two weeks earlier for iPSC-NSCs that were differentiated and matured on PEG hydrogels compared to TCP. Therefore, chemically-defined synthetic hydrogels offer benefits over standard platforms when optimizing culture conditions for cell-based screening and achieve sensitivities comparable to an approved animal testing protocol.