Comparative efficiency of goat mesenchymal stem cell isolation from bone marrow and bone chip

Bone marrow mesenchymal stem cell (BM-MSC) is a type of adult stem cell that offers tremendous potential in clinical use and gene-based therapies. The use of mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) in animal models has shown promising evidences for the cure of certain human diseases. However, in animals certain obstacles like lack of standardised isolation methods and tissues used to derive MSCs often leading to lower yield of MSCs along with cumbersome characterisation steps can hamper their use, particularly for autologous stem cell therapy. In the present experiment, MSCs were isolated from bone marrow and cancellous bone chip collected from iliac crest of goats. The yield of MSCs derived from bone marrow and bone chip was compared and MSCs derived from both the sources were characterized based on cell morphology, plastic adherence, colony-forming property and expression of cell surface markers. Furthermore, these cells were cryopreserved and evaluated for post thaw viability. Interestingly, the yield of bone chip-derived MSCs was ∼3000 times higher when compared with bone-marrow-derived MSCs. MSCs derived from both the sources were plastic adherent, displayed fibroblastoid morphology, exhibited MSC-specific marker expression profile (CD105+CD90+CD45−CD34−), and possessed colony forming capacity when cultured at lower densities. Thus, it was concluded that bone chip could be used as an efficient tissue source for MSC isolation in goats.