Basic Study
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2020. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Stem Cells. Oct 26, 2020; 12(10): 1152-1170
Published online Oct 26, 2020. doi: 10.4252/wjsc.v12.i10.1152
Pericyte-like differentiation of human adipose-derived mesenchymal stem cells: An in vitro study
Giuliana Mannino, Florinda Gennuso, Giovanni Giurdanella, Federica Conti, Filippo Drago, Salvatore Salomone, Debora Lo Furno, Claudio Bucolo, Rosario Giuffrida
Giuliana Mannino, Debora Lo Furno, Rosario Giuffrida, Physiology Section, Department of Biomedical and Biotechnological Sciences, University of Catania, Catania 95123, Italy
Florinda Gennuso, Federica Conti, Filippo Drago, Salvatore Salomone, Claudio Bucolo, Pharmacology Section, Department of Biomedical and Biotechnological Sciences, School of Medicine, University of Catania, Catania 95123, Italy
Giovanni Giurdanella, Biochemistry Section, Department of Biomedical and Biotechnological Sciences, School of Medicine, University of Catania, Catania 95123, Italy
Author contributions: Mannino G and Gennuso F made substantial contributions to conception and design, participated in the acquisition, analysis and interpretation of data; Giurdanella G and Conti F participated in data acquisition; Salomone S and Drago F were involved in data analysis and interpretation, and revising the manuscript critically for important intellectual content; Lo Furno D, Bucolo C and Giuffrida R conceived the project and developed the experimental design, analyzed data and wrote the manuscript. All authors reviewed the manuscript and approved the version to be published.
Supported by “Piano Triennale per la Ricerca 2016-2018 – Linea Intervento 2”, University of Catania, Italy, No. 20722142118.
Institutional review board statement: This study was reviewed and approved by the local ethics committee (Comitato etico Catania1; Authorization n. 155/2018/PO).
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors declare no conflict of interest.
Data sharing statement: No additional data are available.
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: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Debora Lo Furno, PhD, Assistant Professor, Physiology Section, Department of Biomedical and Biotechnological Sciences, University of Catania, No. 95125 Catania, Catania 95123, Italy. lofurno@unict.it
Received: May 15, 2020
Peer-review started: May 15, 2020
First decision: June 7, 2020
Revised: June 18, 2020
Accepted: August 25, 2020
Article in press: August 25, 2020
Published online: October 26, 2020
Processing time: 163 Days and 18.5 Hours
Core Tip

Core Tip: Pericyte-like differentiation was achieved in human adipose-derived mesenchymal stem cells (hASCs) by a culture medium specific for optimal pericyte growth. When co-cultured with retinal endothelial cells, pre-differentiated hASCs increased endothelial junction protein expression and trans-endothelial electrical resistance. Similar to pericytes, differentiated hASCs localized in the typical perivascular position.