It is an object of the present invention to provide a method for easily producing an antigen-specific B cell population comprising IgG-positive B cells specific to a specific antigen. The present invention provides a method for producing a B cell population, comprising culturing B cells, in which the expression of a Bach2 gene has been increased, in the presence of a means for acting on CD40 and/or a BAFF receptor.

Described herein are methods relating to the differentiation of stem cells to more differentiated phenotypes, e.g. to terminally differentiated cell types and/or precursors thereof. In some embodiments, the methods relate to contacting the stem cells with differentiation factors and halting the cell cycle, thereby increasing the rate of differentiation.

The present invention provides a method for inducing adenohypophysis or precursor tissue thereof in vitro from human pluripotent stem cells. The method includes culturing an aggregate of human pluripotent stem cells in suspension in a medium containing a bone morphogenetic protein signal transduction pathway activating substance and a substance acting on the Shh signal pathway to obtain a human cell aggregate containing a hypothalamus neuroepithelial tissue and a surface ectoderm, and further culturing the obtained human cell aggregate containing the hypothalamus neuroepithelial tissue and the surface ectoderm in suspension in a medium containing a bone morphogenetic protein signal transduction pathway activating substance and a substance acting on the Shh signal pathway to induce formation of hypophysial placode and/or Rathke's pouch in the surface ectoderm, thus obtaining a human cell aggregate containing 1) hypothalamus neuroepithelial tissue, and 2) hypophysial placode and/or Rathke's pouch.

Cultivating a pluripotent stem cell in a medium comprising at least one member selected from the group consisting of ethanolamine, an ethanolamine analog, and a pharmaceutically acceptable salt thereof, and which is substantially free of -mercaptoethanol or contains -mercaptoethanol at a concentration of not more than 9 M, and the like, is effective for the proliferation of a pluripotent stem cell while maintaining an undifferentiated state.

To produce and/or maintain nave pluripotent stem cells capable of highly expressing genes important for maintaining an undifferentiated state, which could not be achieved by known methods for producing pluripotent stem cells. The present invention can produce nave pluripotent stem cells capable of maintaining an undifferentiated state by introducing and allowing transient expression of six genes (Oct3/4, Klf4, c-Myc, Sox2, Nanog, and Klf2) among the so-called initializing factors, and further performing culturing in a medium containing LIF, an MEK inhibitor, a GSK3 inhibitor, a cAMP production promoter, a TGF- inhibitor and a PKC inhibitor. Thus, the problem of the present invention can be solved.

A method for vascular regeneration comprises delivering endothelial cells to a lung scaffold, delivering perivascular cells to the lung scaffold, and providing a multiphase culture program to the scaffold. The multiphase culture program comprises a first phase including delivering an angiogenic medium, e.g., having 40-100 ng/ml of pro-angiogenic factors, and a second phase including delivering a stabilization medium, e.g., having 0.5-2% of serum and 1-20 ng/ml of angiogenic factors.

A method for acquiring and producing high-purity renal progenitor cells from a renal progenitor cell population into which pluripotent stem cells are induced to differentiate, by identifying a cell surface antigen marker specific to renal progenitor cells. The disclosed method may include, for example, the steps of: (i) culturing the pluripotent stem cells under conditions that induce differentiation into renal progenitor cells; and (ii) sorting a cell population from the cells obtained at step (i), by using at least one cell surface marker selected from the group consisting of CD9(), CD55(), CD106(+), CD140a(+), CD140b(+), CD165(+), CD271(+) and CD326().

The present invention relates to a medicament for use in a method of extending a cellular cytotoxic immune response against an antigen-comprising protein, the method comprising the step of: i) administering to a patient having T cells activated against an antigen a peptide-loaded major histocompatibility complex class I (MHC-I) presenting cell and an adjuvant which supports a Th-1-mediated response, wherein the peptide is derived from the antigen-comprising protein, thereby re-activating the activated T cell, wherein the peptide-loaded major histocompatibility complex class I (MHC-I) presenting cell of step i) is administered in a time frame of from 0 h to 14 days after the T cells were activated against an antigen.

Methods of producing stem cell conditioned media to treat mammalian injuries or insults. In at least one embodiment of a method of producing a stem cell conditioned media of the present disclosure, the method comprises the steps of culturing at least one stem cell in a first cell culture medium, replacing some or all of the first cell culture medium with a second cell culture medium and further culturing the at least one stem cell in the second cell culture medium, and collecting a quantity of the second cell culture medium after a culture duration, wherein the quantity of the second cell culture medium contains a cell culture byproduct effective to treat a mammalian insult or injury.

Described is the efficient and robust generation of oligodendrocyte progenitor cells (OPCs) and oligodendrocytes from pluripotent stem cells (PSCs). The protocols provided recapitulate the major steps of oligodendrocyte differentiation, from neural stem cells to OLIG2.sup.+ progenitors, and then to O4.sup.+ OPCs, in a significantly shorter time than the 120-150 days required by previous protocols. Furthermore, O4.sup.+ OPCs are able to differentiate into MBP.sup.+ mature oligodendrocytes in vitro, and to myelinate axons in vivo when injected into immuno-compromised Shiverer mice, providing proof of concept that transplantation of PSC-derived cells for remyelination is technically feasible.