Published online Nov 26, 2021. doi: 10.4252/wjsc.v13.i11.1783
Peer-review started: May 5, 2021
First decision: June 23, 2021
Revised: June 25, 2021
Accepted: October 15, 2021
Article in press: October 15, 2021
Published online: November 26, 2021
Processing time: 203 Days and 16.5 Hours
Adipose-derived stem cells (ASCs) have been increasingly explored for cell-based medicine because of their numerous advantages in terms of easy availability, high proliferation rate, multipotent differentiation ability and low immunogenicity. In this respect, they have been widely investigated in the last two decades to develop therapeutic strategies for a variety of human pathologies including eye disease. In ocular diseases involving the retina, various cell types may be affected, such as Müller cells, astrocytes, photoreceptors and retinal pigment epithelium (RPE), which plays a fundamental role in the homeostasis of retinal tissue, by secreting a variety of growth factors that support retinal cells.
To test ASC neural differentiation using conditioned medium (CM) from an RPE cell line (ARPE-19).
ASCs were isolated from adipose tissue, harvested from the subcutaneous region of healthy donors undergoing liposuction procedures. Four ASC culture condi
Depending on the culture medium, ASC proliferation rate and viability showed some significant differences. Overall, less dense populations were observed in serum-free cultures, except for ASCs cultured in ARPE-19 serum-free CM. Moreover, a different cell morphology was seen in these cultures after 8 d of treatment, with more elongated cells, often showing cytoplasmic ramifications. Immunofluorescence results and western blot analysis were indicative of ASC neural differentiation. In fact, basal levels of neural markers detected under control conditions significantly increased when cells were cultured in ARPE-19 CM. Specifically, neural marker overexpression was more marked at 8 d. The most evident increase was observed for NSE and GFAP, a modest increase was observed for nestin, and less relevant changes were observed for PGP9.5.
The presence of growth factors produced by ARPE-19 cells in tissue culture induces ASCs to express neural differentiation markers typical of the neuronal and glial cells of the retina.
Core Tip: Neural-like differentiation of adipose-derived stem cells (ASCs) was tested using a conditioned medium from ARPE-19 cells, a cell line derived from human retinal pigment epithelium. Following this treatment, the expression of typical glial and neuronal markers increased in a time-dependent manner. Neural-like differentiated ASCs may represent a valuable tool for cell-based therapeutic approaches in the field of regenerative medicine for the treatment of eye diseases.