Generating Multiple Kidney Progenitors and Cell Types from Human Pluripotent Stem Cells

Human pluripotent stem cells (hPSCs) have been well known for their ability to generate kidney cell types. We developed a protocol that utilizes a set of growth factors to give rise to kidney progenitors, which when differentiated further in a monolayer gives rise to podocyte precursors, mesangial cells, proximal and distal tubular epithelial cells, and collecting duct cells. This article describes in detail how to obtain each of these segment-specific kidney cell types from hPSCs. Once obtained as a homogenous population, these cells are invaluable for nephrotoxicity testing, for disease modeling, and in tissue engineering approaches such as 3D bioprinting and seeding on acellular matrices and scaffolds.