hPSC-derived lung organoids: Potential opportunities and challenges

Three-dimensional hPSC-derived lung organoids resemble the fetal lung stage, making them an excellent model for studying human lung development. However, current hPSC-derived lung organoids remain incomplete as they lack native lung components such as vasculature, neurons and immune cells. This highlights the need to generate more complex hPSC-derived lung organoids that can faithfully mimic native human lungs for studying human lung development, regeneration, disease modeling and drug screen. In this review, we will discuss the current studies related to the generation of hPSC-derived lung organoids, highlighting how hPSC-derived lung organoids can contribute to the understanding of human lung development. We further focus on potential approaches to generate more complex hPSC-derived lung organoids containing native cellular components. Finally, we discuss the present limitations and potential applications of hPSC-derived lung organoids in the future.