Analysis and characterization of hematopoietic progenitor cells from fetalbone marrow, adult bone marrow, peripheral blood, and cord blood

Hematopoietic stem cell transplantation has been increasingly used to repla ce a defective hematopoietic system and to treat various genetic defects as well as malignant diseases. However, the limitations of conventional bone marrow transplantation have stimulated an intense interest in exploring the use of alternative sources of hematopoietic stem cells, including peripher al blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) and cord blood (CB). ii major investigati ve effort of our laboratory has been focused on evaluating fetal bone marro w (FBM) for transplantation. The current study compares and characterizes t he functional and phenotypic characteristics of FBM, CB, adult bone marrow (ABM), and PBMC by clonogenicity assays, immunogenicity, and the quantifica tion of progenitor cells. There was a striking difference in the proportion of CD34(+) cells in FBM, ABM, PBMC, and CB (24.6%, 2.1%, 0.5%, and 2.0%, r espectively). The clonogenic potential, as measured by colony forming unit in culture (CFU-C) assay, was significantly higher in FBM when compared wit h ABM, PBMC, and CB (202.5, 73.5, 40.8, and 65.5 colonies/10(5) cells, resp ectively). There was a significant decrease in proliferative responsiveness in mixed lymphocyte reaction (MLR) assay of FBM and CB compared with ABM a nd PBMC. These observations indicate that each source of hematopoietic stem cells has different intrinsic properties closely correlated with ontogenet ic age that is a vital determinant for phenotypic characteristics, lineage commitments, immunogenicity, and proliferative potentials.