The multipotential of rat oral mucosal lamina propria progenitor cells

Objective: To explore the multipotential ability of mesenchymal progenitor cells, which were derived from oral mucosal lamina propria. Methods: Isolate mesenchymal progenitor cells from rat oral mucosa, according to the way that isolate adult stem cells from skin dermis. Culture these cells in D/F12 medium supplied with B27 and fetal bovine serum. The proliferation ability was investigated by cell growth curve, clonal study and flow cytometer (FCM). Then cultured clonal populations from individual progenitor cells in defined medium, and stained the cells after induced with histochemical methods to explore multilineage potential of these cells. Results: The isolated cells proliferated actively in vitro and retained normal karyotype after long-term culture. Clonal study demonstrated that these cells exhibited clonalgenerating capability. The histochemical findings demonstrated that clonal populations from individual progenitor cells could form neural cells, osteoblasts and adipocytes by induced in defined medium. Conclusion: It demonstrates that there is a population of mesenchymal progenitor cells exists in rat oral mucosal lamina propria, which has multipotential differentiation ability.

Key words mesenchymal progenitor cell; adipocyte; osteoblast; neuron; cell differentiation

This research was supported by the grants from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (30700946) and the National Science Foundation for Post-doctoral Scientists of China (20070410964).