Systematic Reviews
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2021. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Stem Cells. Aug 26, 2021; 13(8): 1134-1150
Published online Aug 26, 2021. doi: 10.4252/wjsc.v13.i8.1134
Induced pluripotent stem cells as suitable sensors for fibromyalgia and myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome
María B Monzón-Nomdedeu, Karl J Morten, Elisa Oltra
María B Monzón-Nomdedeu, School of Biotechnology, Universidad Católica de Valencia San Vicente Mártir, Valencia 46001, Spain
Karl J Morten, Nuffield Department of Women's and Reproductive Health, The Women Centre, University of Oxford, Oxford OX3 9DU, United Kingdom
Elisa Oltra, Department of Pathology, Universidad Católica de Valencia San Vicente Mártir, Valencia 46001, Spain
Elisa Oltra, Centro de Investigación Traslacional San Alberto Magno, Universidad Católica de Valencia San Vicente Mártir, Valencia 46001, Spain
Author contributions: Monzón-Nondedeu MB and Oltra E wrote the first draft; All authors critically reviewed and edited this manuscript.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors declare that they have no competing interests.
PRISMA 2009 Checklist statement: The authors have read the PRISMA 2009 Checklist, and the manuscript was prepared and revised according to the PRISMA 2009 Checklist.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Elisa Oltra, PhD, Full Professor, Department of Pathology, Universidad Católica de Valencia San Vicente Mártir, C/Quevedo 2, Valencia 46001, Spain. elisa.oltra@ucv.es
Received: February 18, 2021
Peer-review started: February 18, 2021
First decision: March 30, 2021
Revised: April 19, 2021
Accepted: July 5, 2021
Article in press: July 5, 2021
Published online: August 26, 2021
Core Tip

Core Tip: Because of the special ability to sense environmental cues we propose that induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) are suitable for use as a sensor system for metabolic disease. As fibromyalgia and myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome body-fluids have unique metabolic profiles, the applicability of iPSC-based bioassays for those conditions are worth investigating. We envisage the development of iPSC platforms that allow differential diagnosis and disease-specific high-throughput drug-screening platforms. Using healthy iPSCs and patient body fluids has significant advantages over using cell lines, primary culture of patient cells or iPSCs derived from patients. A consistent iPSC control-cell line platform will provide a robust metabolic/phenotypic model allowing faster, cost-effective, large cohort screenings.