Transplantation of dermal multipotent cells promotes the hematopoietic recovery in sublethally irradiated rats.

Our previous study indicated that dermal multipotent cells with the differentiation capacity to form cells with the phenotypic properties of osteocytes, adipocytes, chondrocytes, and neurons in specific inducing media could be isolated from the enzymatically dissociated dermal cells of newborn rats by their adherence to culture dish plastic. We have also observed that the systemic transplantation of dermal multipotent cells could not repopulate the hematopoietic system in lethally irradiated rats. In this paper, we found that a transplantation of plastic-adherent dermal multipotent cells into sublethally irradiated rats led to a significant increase of white blood cells in peripheral blood, nucleated cells, CFU-GM, and CFU-F colonies in bone marrow. FISH analysis, using a Y-chromosome specific probe, showed that dermal multipotent cells could engraft into bone marrow in recipients. Flow cytometry (FACS) analysis also showed that the proportion of CD2 and CD25 positive lymphocytes in peripheral blood did not change significantly in two weeks after transplantation. By these results, we infer that dermal multipotent cells may represent an alternative origin of mesenchymal stem cells to restore marrow microenvironment and promote the survival, engraftment, and proliferation of hematopoietic cells.