The isoflavone puerarin promotes generation of human iPSC-derived pre-oligodendrocytes and enhances endogenous remyelination in rodent models

Puerarin, a natural isoflavone, is commonly used as a Chinese herbal medicine for the treatment of various cardiovascular and neurological disorders. It has been found to be neuroprotective via TrK-PI3K/Akt pathway, which is associated with anti-inflammatory and antioxidant effects. Myelin damage in diseases such as in multiple sclerosis (MS) and ischemia induces activation of endogenous oligodendrocyte progenitor cells (OPC) and subsequent remyelination by newly formed oligodendrocytes. It has been shown that human induced pluripotent stem cells (hiPSC)-derived OPCs promote remyelination when transplanted to the brains of disease models. Here we ask whether and how puerarin is beneficial to the generation of hiPSC-derived OPCs and oligodendrocytes, and to the endogenous remyelination in mouse demyelination model. Our results show that puerarin increases the proportion of O4+ pre-oligodendrocytes differentiated from iPSC-derived neural stem cells. In vitro, puerarin increases proliferation of rat OPCs and enhanced mitochondrial activity. Treatment of puerarin at progenitor stage increases the yielding of differentiated oligodendrocytes. In rat organotypic brain slice culture, puerarin promotes both myelination and remyelination. In vivo, puerarin increases oligodendrocyte repopulation during remyelination in mouse spinal cord following lysolethicin-induced demyelination. Our findings suggest that puerarin promotes oligodendrocyte lineage progression and myelin repair, with a potential to be developed into therapeutic agent for neurological diseases associated with myelin damage.