Basic Study
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2023. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Stem Cells. Jul 26, 2023; 15(7): 701-712
Published online Jul 26, 2023. doi: 10.4252/wjsc.v15.i7.701
Commitment of human mesenchymal stromal cells to skeletal lineages is independent of their morphogenetic capacity
Jessica Cristina Marín-Llera, Damián García-García, Estefania Garay-Pacheco, Victor Adrian Cortes-Morales, Juan Jose Montesinos-Montesinos, Jesus Chimal-Monroy
Jessica Cristina Marín-Llera, Damián García-García, Estefania Garay-Pacheco, Medicina Genómica y Toxicología Ambiental, Instituto de Investigaciones Biomédicas, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Coyoacan 04510, Mexico
Victor Adrian Cortes-Morales, Juan Jose Montesinos-Montesinos, Laboratorio de Células Troncales Mesenquimales, Unidad de Investigación Médica en Enfermedades Oncológicas, Hospital de Oncología Centro Medico Nacional Siglo XXI, Instituto Mexicano del Seguro Social, Mexico City 06720, Mexico
Jesus Chimal-Monroy, Departamento de Medicina Genómica y Toxicología Ambiental, Instituto de Investigaciones Biomédicas, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Coyoacan 04510, Mexico
Author contributions: Marín-Llera JC and Chimal-Monroy J conceptualized the research and wrote the manuscript; Marín-Llera JC, Montesinos-Montesinos JJ, and Chimal-Monroy J discussed the data; Marín-Llera JC, García-García RD, and Garay-Pacheco E performed the experiments; Adrian Cortes-Morales V maintained and prepared the mesenchymal stromal cells; and all authors approved the final version of the manuscript.
Supported by the Dirección General de Asuntos del Personal Académico (DGAPA)-Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, No. IN211117; Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnología (CONACyT), No. 1887 CONACyT-Fronteras de la Ciencia awarded to Chimal-Monroy J; García-García RD and Garay-Pacheco E received an undergraduate scholarship; and Marin-Llera JC a postdoctoral fellowship from the Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnología, No. CONACyT-Fronteras de la Ciencia-1887.
Institutional review board statement: The studies involving human cells were reviewed and approved by the Institutional Review Board for health research of the Instituto Mexicano del Seguro Social (IMSS, Mexico City, Mexico).
Institutional animal care and use committee statement: The handling protocol for the use of chicken embryos was done in embryonic stages in which the embryos do not feel pain because the nervous system development is not yet complete.
Conflict-of-interest statement: All the authors report no relevant conflicts of interest for this article.
Data sharing statement: No additional data are available.
ARRIVE guidelines statement: The authors have read the ARRIVE guidelines, and the manuscript was prepared and revised according to the ARRIVE guidelines.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Jesus Chimal-Monroy, PhD, Research Scientist, Senior Researcher, Departamento de Medicina Genómica y Toxicología Ambiental, Instituto de Investigaciones Biomédicas, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Ciudad Universitaria, Apartado Postal 70228, Coyoacan 04510, Mexico. jchimal@unam.mx
Received: December 29, 2022
Peer-review started: December 29, 2022
First decision: April 27, 2023
Revised: May 18, 2023
Accepted: June 25, 2023
Article in press: June 25, 2023
Published online: July 26, 2023
Processing time: 208 Days and 3.2 Hours
Abstract
BACKGROUND

Mesenchymal stromal cells (MSCs) are multipotent cell populations obtained from fetal and adult tissues. They share some characteristics with limb bud mesodermal cells such as differentiation potential into osteogenic, chondrogenic, and tenogenic lineages and an embryonic mesodermal origin. Although MSCs differentiate into skeletal-related lineages in vitro, they have not been shown to self-organize into complex skeletal structures or connective tissues, as in the limb. In this work, we demonstrate that the expression of molecular markers to commit MSCs to skeletal lineages is not sufficient to generate skeletal elements in vivo.

AIM

To evaluate the potential of MSCs to differentiate into skeletal lineages and generate complex skeletal structures using the recombinant limb (RL) system.

METHODS

We used the experimental system of RLs from dissociated-reaggregated human placenta (PL) and umbilical cord blood (UCB) MSCs. After being harvested and reaggregated in a pellet, cultured cells were introduced into an ectodermal cover obtained from an early chicken limb bud. Next, this filled ectoderm was grafted into the back of a donor chick embryo. Under these conditions, the cells received and responded to the ectoderm’s embryonic signals in a spatiotemporal manner to differentiate and pattern into skeletal elements. Their response to differentiation and morphogenetic signals was evaluated by quantitative polymerase chain reaction, histology, immunofluorescence, scanning electron microscopy, and in situ hybridization.

RESULTS

We found that human PL-MSCs and UCB-MSCs constituting the RLs expressed chondrogenic, osteogenic, and tenogenic molecular markers while differentially committing into limb lineages but could not generate complex structures in vivo. MSCs-RL from PL or UCB were committed early to chondrogenic lineage. Nevertheless, the UCB-RL osteogenic commitment was favored, although preferentially to a tenogenic cell fate. These findings suggest that the commitment of MSCs to differentiate into skeletal lineages differs according to the source and is independent of their capacity to generate skeletal elements or connective tissue in vivo. Our results suggest that the failure to form skeletal structures may be due to the intrinsic characteristics of MSCs. Thus, it is necessary to thoroughly evaluate the biological aspects of MSCs and how they respond to morphogenetic signals in an in vivo context.

CONCLUSION

PL-MSCs and UCB-MSCs express molecular markers of differentiation into skeletal lineages, but they are not sufficient to generate complex skeletal structures in vivo.

Keywords: Human mesenchymal stromal cells, Recombinant limbs, Mesenchymal stromal cell morphogenesis, Mesenchymal stromal cell in vivo differentiation, Skeletal tissues

Core Tip: Human mesenchymal stromal cells (MSCs) from umbilical cord blood or placenta can differentiate into osteogenic and chondrogenic lineages in culture systems and have been used in regenerative medicine. Here, we used the recombinant limb (RL) model to provide evidence that MSCs do not have the ability to generate skeletal structures in vivo. MSCs received and responded to the ectoderm’s embryonic spatiotemporal signals in this RL system. However, the expression of differentiation markers of skeletal lineages was not sufficient to generate skeletal structures in vivo.