Bone Marrow Transplantation Results in Human Donor Blood Cells Acquiring and Displaying Mouse Recipient Class I MHC and CD45 Antigens on Their Surface

Background: Mouse models of human disease are invaluable for determining the differentiation ability and functional capacity of stem cells. The best example is bone marrow transplants for studies of hematopoietic stem cells. For organ studies, the interpretation of the data can be difficult as transdifferentiation, cell fusion or surface antigen transfer (trogocytosis) can be misinterpreted as differentiation. These events have not been investigated in hematopoietic stem cell transplant models. Methodology/Principal Findings: In this study we investigated fusion and trogocytosis involving blood cells during bone marrow transplantation using a xenograft model. We report that using a standard SCID repopulating assay almost 100 % of the human donor cells appear as hybrid blood cells containing both mouse and human surface antigens. Conclusion/Significance: Hybrid cells are not the result of cell-cell fusion events but appear to be due to efficient surface antigen transfer, a process referred to as trogocytosis. Antigen transfer appears to be non-random and includes all donor cells regardless of sub-type. We also demonstrate that irradiation preconditioning enhances the frequency of hybrid cell

Candidate Genes for Expansion and Transformation of Hematopoietic Stem Cells by NUP98-HOX Fusion Genes

BACKGROUND: Hox genes are implicated in hematopoietic stem cell (HSC) regulation as well as in leukemia development through translocation with the nucleoporin gene NUP98. Interestingly, an engineered NUP98-HOXA10 (NA10) fusion can induce a several hundred-fold expansion of HSCs in vitro and NA10 and the AML-associated fusion gene NUP98-HOXD13 (ND13) have a virtually indistinguishable ability to transform myeloid progenitor cells in vitro and to induce leukemia in collaboration with MEIS1 in vivo. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: These findings provided a potentially powerful approach to identify key pathways mediating Hox-induced expansion and transformation of HSCs by identifying gene expression changes commonly induced by ND13 and NA10 but not by a NUP98-Hox fusion with a non-DNA binding homedomain mutation (N51S). The gene expression repertoire of purified murine bone marrow Sca-1+Lin- cells transduced with retroviral vectors encoding for these genes was established using the Affymetrix GeneChip MOE430A. Approximately seventy genes were differentially expressed in ND13 and NA10 cells that were significantly changed by both compared to the ND13(N51S) mutant. Intriguingly, several of these potential Hox target genes have been implicated in HSC expansion and self-renewal, including the tyrosine kinase receptor Flt3, the prion protein, Prnp, hepatic leukemia factor, Hlf and Jagged-2, Jag2. Consistent with these results, FLT3, HLF and JAG2 expression correlated with HOX A cluster gene expression in human leukemia samples. CONCLUSIONS: In conclusion this study has identified several novel Hox downstream target genes and provides important new leads to key regulators of the expansion and transformation of hematopoietic stem cells by Hox

How many specific B cells are needed to protect against a virus?

The size of the Ab repertoire has been estimated to comprise theoretically somewhere between > 10(10) and approximately 10(4) specificities, dependent on the criteria used. In an attempt to estimate the anti-viral protective Ab repertoire of the mouse the B cell and Ab-forming cell (AFC) frequencies and protective neutralizing Ab levels during the course of an infection with vesicular stomatitis virus (VSV) were analyzed. Determination of AFC frequencies, limiting dilution assays, and adoptive transfer experiments to SCID mice revealed that during the acute phase (day 8) of the immune response, more than 50% of all IgG2a-producing AFCs were specific for VSV, most of them recognizing the neutralizing determinant. In a later phase (days 21 or 50), 10 to 20 times fewer VSV-specific AFCs were present, corresponding to a frequency of approximately 1:10(4) spleen cells. Finally, in a protection assay in SCID mice, adoptively transferred protective Ab concentrations were found to be approximately 1 to 10 micrograms Ab/ml mouse serum. Because during the memory phase of the anti-VSV response usually 10(4) AFC/mouse are engaged to maintain a high level of memory IgG against the neutralizing determinant on VSV and if one assumes a total number of about 10(6) AFCs/mouse, these data suggest a rather limited neutralizing anti-viral protective memory-AFC repertoire of 10(2) to 10(4) different specificities

Engineering humanized mice for improved hematopoietic reconstitution

Humanized mice are immunodeficient animals engrafted with human hematopoietic stem cells that give rise to various lineages of human blood cells throughout the life of the mouse. This article reviews recent advances in the generation of humanized mice, focusing on practical considerations. We discuss features of different immunodeficient recipient mouse strains, sources of human hematopoietic stem cells, advances in expansion and genetic modification of hematopoietic stem cells, and techniques to modulate the cytokine environment of recipient mice, in order to enhance reconstitution of specific human blood lineage cells. We highlight the opportunities created by new technologies and discuss practical considerations on how to make best use of the widening array of basic models for specific research applications.Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Singapore-MIT Alliance in Research and Technology (SMART)Ragon Institute of MGH, MIT and Harvar