Patent ID: 7588937

Claim:
A method of obtaining a population of midbrain dopamine neurons, comprising: (a) obtaining a synchronous population of cells that are cultured from embryonic stem cells, and which are characterized by an early rosette morphology and are Sox1 − , Pax6 + ; (b) culturing the cells obtained in (a) in a neural basal medium with fibroblast growth factor-8 (FGF8), wherein resulting cells are Pax6 + , Sox1 + and engrailed 1 positive (EN-1+) neuroepithelial cells; (c) expanding the cells from step (b) in a neural basal medium with sonic hedgehog (SHH) and FGF8, wherein resulting cells are dopaminergic neural precursors; and (d) culturing the cells from step (c) in a neural basal differentiation medium without SHH and FGF8 until resulting cells express tyrosine hydroxylase (TH), aromatic acid decarboxylase (AADC), EN-1, vesicular monoamine transporter 2 (VMAT2) and dopamine transporter (DAT) but do not express dopamine beta hydroxylase (DbH) and phenylethanolamine N-methyltransferase (PNMT), and produce dopamine.