Advancing human induced pluripotent stem cell-derived blood brain barrier models for studying immune cell interactions

Human induced pluripotent stem cell (hiPSC)-derived blood-brain barrier (BBB) models have proven to be useful to study disease pathomechanisms and drug delivery into the central nervous system (CNS). There are several protocols available to differentiate hiPSCs into brain microvascular endothelial cell (BMEC)-like cells. It is therefore relevant that researchers choose the appropriate protocol for their research question . The speakers of this webinar have established a novel protocol, the Extended Endothelial Cell culture Method (EECM), allowing to differentiate hiPSCs into BMECs resembling primary human BMECs with respect to barrier properties and endothelial adhesion molecule expression. They will furthermore introduce EECM-BMECs as suitable tool to study BBB dysfunction in multiple sclerosis.