Adipose tissue-derived multipotent stromal cells have a higher immunomodulatory capacity than their bone marrow-derived counterparts.

Adipose tissue-derived multipotent stromal cells (AT-MSCs) are studied as an alternative to bone marrow-derived multipotent stromal cells (BM-MSCs) for immunomodulatory treatment. In this study, we systematically compared the immunomodulatory capacities of BM-MSCs and AT-MSCs derived from age-matched donors. We found that BM-MSCs and AT-MSCs share a similar immunophenotype and capacity for in vitro multilineage differentiation. BM-MSCs and AT-MSCs showed comparable immunomodulatory effects as they were both able to suppress proliferation of stimulated peripheral blood mononuclear cells and to inhibit differentiation of monocyte-derived immature dendritic cells. However, at equal cell numbers, the AT-MSCs showed more potent immunomodulatory effects in both assays as compared with BM-MSCs. Moreover, AT-MSCs showed a higher level of secretion of cytokines that have been implicated in the immunomodulatory modes of action of multipotent stromal cells, such as interleukin-6 and transforming growth factor-β1. This is correlated with higher metabolic activity of AT-MSCs compared with BM-MSCs. We conclude that the immunomodulatory capacities of BM-MSCs and AT-MSCs are similar, but that differences in cytokine secretion cause AT-MSCs to have more potent immunomodulatory effects than BM-MSCs. Therefore, lower numbers of AT-MSCs evoke the same level of immunomodulation. These data indicate that AT-MSCs can be considered as a good alternative to BM-MSCs for immunomodulatory therapy.