Pluripotent stem cells have the potential to differentiate into all the cell types in the adult body. However, there is not a single type of pluripotent cell: during embryonic development, there are different cells that are pluripotent but also show significantly different cellular identities. These different cell types can be partially recapitulated in vitro and, in this way, allow the study of the molecular mechanisms that regulate pluripotency and the interconversion between these states, as well as the first events of cell differentiation. Knowing these mechanisms in detail is essential to understand the biology of stem cells and for their future application in regenerative therapies. In the laboratory, we actively work in this area in both human and mouse pluripotent stem cells, using gene editing techniques to study the specific role of different genes.
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