Effects of recombinant human tumor necrosis factor alpha, recombinant human gamma-interferon, and prostaglandin E on colony formation of human hematopoietic progenitor cells stimulated by natural human pluripotent colony-stimulating factor, pluripoietin alpha, and recombinant erythropoietin in serum-free cultures.

The influences of pure human pluripotent colony-stimulating factor, highly purified pluripoietin alpha, pure recombinant human tumor necrosis factor alpha, pure recombinant human gamma-interferon, and natural prostaglandin E1 (PGE1) were evaluated on colony formation of multipotential and erythroid progenitor cells in the presence of recombinant erythropoietin and hemin and on colony formation of granulocyte-macrophage progenitors in normal human marrow cultured in the presence or absence of serum. Serum was replaced by bovine serum albumin, iron-saturated transferrin, cholesterol, and calcium chloride. Increasing concentrations of pluripotent colony-stimulating factor and pluripoietin alpha stimulated increasing numbers of colonies from nonadherent low-density T-lymphocyte-depleted cells in the absence and presence of serum. Growth was usually greater in the presence of serum and on a unit basis pluripoietin alpha was more active than pluripotent colony-stimulating factor. Recombinant human tumor necrosis factor alpha and recombinant human gamma-interferon suppressed colony formation colony forming unit-granulocyte-macrophage, burst forming unit-erythroid, and colony forming unit-granulocyte-erythroid-macrophage-megakaryocyte; PGE1 suppressed colony formation by colony-forming unit-granulocyte-macrophage, stimulated colony formation by burst forming unit-erythroid, and had no effects on colony formation by colony forming unit-granulocyte-erythroid-macrophage-megakaryocyte in both serum-containing and serum-free medium. The PGE1 enhancing effects on erythroid colony formation required T-lymphocytes. Thus, results are similar using serum-containing and serum-free cultures of human bone marrow cells and serum-free defined culture medium can be used to study the mechanism of action of purified natural and recombinant growth and suppressor molecules in vitro.