title: Engraftment of severe combined immune deficient mice receiving allogeneic bone marrow via In utero or postnatal transfer.
abstract: Although in utero transplantation (IUT) has been shown to be effective in treating human severe combined immune deficiency (SCID), the relative merit of IUT as compared with postnatal bone marrow transplantation (BMT) for SCID is unknown. Therefore, comparative studies were undertaken in mice to determine the engraftment outcome in these two settings. Because T-cell depletion (TCD) reduces graft-versus-host disease (GVHD) severity but compromises alloengraftment, studies were performed with TCD or non-TCD BM and GVHD risk was assessed using a tissue scoring system and by the adoptive transfer of splenocytes from engrafted mice into secondary recipients. Non-SCID recipients received pre-BMT irradiation to simulate those circumstances in which conditioning is required for alloengraftment. IUT recipients of non-TCD and especially TCD BM cells in general had higher levels of donor T-cell and myeloid peripheral blood (PB) engraftment than nonconditioned SCID recipients. Increased TCD or non-TCD BM cell numbers in adult SCID recipients resulted in similar levels of PB engraftment as IUT recipients. However, under these conditions, mean GVHD scores were higher than in IUT recipients. The majority of adoptive transfer recipients of splenocytes from IUT recipients were GVHD-free, consistent with the in vitro evidence of tolerance to host alloantigens. Total body irradiation (TBI)-treated mice that had the highest engraftment had evidence of thymic damage as denoted by a higher proportion of thymic and splenic T cells with a memory phenotype as compared with IUT recipients. IUT mice had vigorous thymic reconstitution by 3 weeks of age. Our data indicate that IUT has a number of advantages as compared with postnatal BMT. Future studies examining the fine specificity of immunoreconstitution in IUT versus postnatal BMT are indicated.
authors.affiliation: University of Minnesota Cancer Center and Department of Pediatrics, Division of Bone Marrow Transplantation and Pediatric Oncology, Therapeutic Radiology, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, USA.
authors.forename: B R
authors.initials: BR
authors.lastname: Blazar
authors.forename: P A
authors.initials: PA
authors.lastname: Taylor
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: McElmurry
authors.forename: L
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Tian
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Panoskaltsis-Mortari
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Lam
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Lees
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Waldschmidt
authors.forename: D A
authors.initials: DA
authors.lastname: Vallera
mesh_terms: D019264:Adoptive Transfer; D000367:Age Factors; D000818:Animals; D000831:Animals, Newborn; D001805:Blood Transfusion, Intrauterine; D016026:Bone Marrow Transplantation / Q000009:adverse effects / Q000379:methods*; D006085:Graft Survival; D006086:Graft vs Host Disease / Q000209:etiology; D006410:Hematopoiesis; D007121:Immunocompetence; D007274:Injections, Intraperitoneal; D018655:Lymphocyte Count; D016131:Lymphocyte Subsets; D008221:Lymphoid Tissue / Q000166:cytology; D051379:Mice; D008807:Mice, Inbred BALB C; D008810:Mice, Inbred C57BL; D016513:Mice, SCID; D011828:Radiation Chimera; D011833:Radiation Injuries, Experimental / Q000209:etiology / Q000473:pathology; D016511:Severe Combined Immunodeficiency / Q000628:therapy*; D013950:Thymus Gland / Q000473:pathology / Q000528:radiation effects; D019172:Transplantation Conditioning; D014916:Whole-Body Irradiation / Q000009:adverse effects