Cytokine-pretreatment of CD34+ cord blood stem cells in vitro reduces long-term cell engraftment in NOD/SCID mice

Stem cell homing, engraftment and organ regeneration are controlled by cytokines, chemokines and cell–cell interactions. In this paper, cytokine effects on homing- and engraftment-related characteristics of CD34+ cord blood cells were examined. Untreated CD34+ cells were mainly in the G0/G1 cell cycle phase, expressed adhesion receptors on a low level, were positive for vimentin, and negative for the epithelial marker cytokeratin 8/18. Treatment with stem cell factor (SCF) stimulated cell proliferation, increased the number of cells in S and G2/M cell cycle phase as well as the expression of adhesion receptors. The expression of cytokeratin 8/18 was increased and that of vimentin remained unchanged. Hepatocyte growth factor (HGF) did not stimulate cell proliferation and expression of adhesion receptors, but increased expression of cytokeratin 8/18. In NOD/SCID mice, kinetics of stem cell distribution revealed a fast elimination of human cells from blood. An increase in the number of engrafted cells was observed in different mouse organs in a time-dependent manner, preferentially in bone marrow, spleen and liver. Pretreatment with SCF resulted in reduction of long-term engraftment in bone marrow. HGF pretreatment of cord blood cells showed no significant effects on long-term engraftment capacity in mouse organs compared to untreated cells. Our data provide in vivo evidence that pretreatment of CD34+ cells with SCF reduces long-term cell engraftment in NOD/SCID mice.