Human Myelin Spheres for In Vitro Oligodendrocyte Maturation, Myelination and Neurological Disease Modeling

Abstract

Demyelinating diseases, such as multiple sclerosis, damage the protective myelin sheaths of the central nervous system. The development of effective therapies has been hampered by the lack of models that accurately replicate human myelin biology. Here we present a novel method to generate human myelin spheres (MyS) by coculturing of hPSC-derived neuronal and oligodendrocyte precursor cells, to create myelinated neurons. Using multimodal analyses including confocal and (electron)microscopy, single-nuclei transcriptomics, lipidomics, and electrophysiology, we demonstrate myelination in MyS as early as six weeks into coculture. These myelinated structures mature over time into multilamellar and compacted myelin sheaths with lipid compositions and transcriptomic profiles mirror the temporal dynamics of in vivo human oligodendrocyte development and neuronal myelination, resembling those of late fetal/postnatal oligodendrocytes. By employing lysolecithin-induced demyelination and Rabies virus infection experiments, we demonstrate the potential of MyS as an innovative, physiologically relevant platform for studying myelin-related neurodegeneration and neuroinfection.