AICAR

AICAR is an adenosine analog that selectively activates AMP-activated protein kinase (AMPK). AMPK regulates lipid and glucose metabolism to maintain cellular energy homeostasis (Hardie and Carling).

MAINTENANCE & SELF-RENEWAL

• Induces upregulation of the pluripotency network genes (Klf4, Klf2, Nanog, Oct4, Myc, Sox2) and epigenetic-associated proteins (Dnmt3a, Mbd3) in mouse ES cells, and inhibits retinoic acid-induced differentiation (Adamo et al.; Shi et al).

DIFFERENTIATION

• Promotes differentiation and mineralization of MC3T3-E1 osteoblastic cells (Kanazawa et al.).
• Inhibits proliferation and promotes osteogenic differentiation, while inhibiting adipogenic differentiation, of human amnion-derived mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) and rabbit bone marrow-derived MSCs (Wu et al.).
• Suppresses proliferation and induces astroglial differentiation in neural stem cells (NSCs) and in the immortalized NSC line C17.2 (C17.2-NSC; Zang et al. 2008, 2009).
• Decreased proliferation and Nanog expression in mouse embryonic stem (ES) cells, with increased erythroid differentiation (Chae et al.)