James Thomson, a top rank scientific innovator in stem cell research with ties to UCSB, led one of two research teams that last month announced the successful reprogramming of human skin cells into stem cells. These are the precursor form of cell that can develop into any of the 220 types of cells in the human body.

To induce skin cells to form what scientists call a pluripotent state, a condition essentially the same as that of embryonic stem cells, the Thomson team introduced a set of four genes into the skin cells.

While Thomson is encouraged that the reprogrammed cells will speed new cell-based therapies to treat diseases, he said more work is required to refine the techniques through which the new cells were generated. One reason is that for therapeutic safety, methods need to be developed to remove the viruses used to ferry the genes into the skin cells.

If perfected, the new technique would bring reprogrammed stem cells within reach of many more scientists. Ethical and legal controversies currently surrounding the scientific use of embryonic stem cells would presumably fade by using skin cells.

Thomson, who has been described as the father of stem cell research, is a professor at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, a faculty member of the Genome Center of Wisconsin, and an adjunct professor in UCSB’s Department of Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology. He will be on campus on Dec. 7 to visit his lab and to hire three to four employees to help with experiments.

He has conducted pioneering work in the isolation and culture of nonhuman primate and human embryonic stem (ES) cells––undifferentiated cells of the body. Human ES cells provide researchers with unprecedented access to the cellular components of the human body, with applications in basic research, drug discovery, and transplantation medicine.

The current focus of Thomson’s research is on understanding how ES cells can form any cell in the body; how an ES cell chooses between self-renewal and the initial decision to differentiate; and how a differentiated cell with limited developmental potential can be reprogrammed.