In 1998, human embryonic stem cells were first identified, and just nine years later, a group of scientists in Japan were able to take skin cells and reprogram them with very powerful viruses to create a kind of pluripotent stem cell called an induced pluripotent stem cell, or what we refer to as an IPS cell.
1998年，人类首次发现胚胎干细胞。 仅仅9年之后， 日本的一个研究小组就成功地采集皮肤细胞， 植入强力病毒，对其进行基因重组， 将其转变成一种多能干细胞， 这种干细胞被称为诱导性多能干细胞， 也就是俗称的IPS干细胞。