title: Differentiation of adult human bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells into Schwann-like cells in vitro.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To investigate the differentiative capability of adult human bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (BMSCs) into Schwann-like cells.
  
  
  METHODS
  Bone marrows were aspirated from healthy donors and mononuclear cells were separated by Percoll lymphocytes separation liquid (1.073 g/ml) with centrifugation, cells were cultured in DMEM/F12 (1:1) medium containing 10% fetal bovine serum (FBS), 20 ng/ml epidermal growth factor (EGF) and 20 ng/ml basic fibroblast growth factor (bFGF). Cells of passage 1 were identified with immunocytochemistry.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Mononuclear cells separated by Percoll's were passaged 10 times by trypsin/ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid (EDTA) digestion in 40 days, and BMSCs increased about 6x10(7) times in this short period. Immunohistochemistry identified that BMSCs were CD34- and CD31-, but they expressed neuron specific enolase; 0.01%-0.02% of total cells expressed nestin, the marker for neural progenitor cells; 40%-50% cells stained heavily by neurofilament 200; and no glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP) positive cells were identified; S100 expression was detected among 0.1%-0.2% cells.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Bone marrow contains the stem cells with the ability of differentiating into Schwann-like cells, which may represent an alternative stem cell sources for neural transplantation.
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurosurgery, Chaozhou Central Hospital, Guangdong 521021, China. yangleeyee@sina.com
authors.forename: Li-ye
authors.initials: LY
authors.lastname: Yang
authors.forename: Jia-kun
authors.initials: JK
authors.lastname: Zheng
authors.forename: Chao-yang
authors.initials: CY
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: Wen-yu
authors.initials: WY
authors.lastname: Li
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001854:Bone Marrow Cells / Q000166:cytology* / Q000378:metabolism; D002454:Cell Differentiation / Q000502:physiology*; D049109:Cell Proliferation; D006801:Humans; D007150:Immunohistochemistry; D007381:Intermediate Filament Proteins / Q000378:metabolism; D059630:Mesenchymal Stem Cells / Q000166:cytology* / Q000378:metabolism; D009419:Nerve Tissue Proteins / Q000378:metabolism; D064231:Nestin; D016900:Neurofilament Proteins / Q000378:metabolism; D010751:Phosphopyruvate Hydratase / Q000378:metabolism; D009418:S100 Proteins / Q000378:metabolism; D012583:Schwann Cells / Q000166:cytology*
chemical_list: D007381:Intermediate Filament Proteins; C577484:NES protein, human; D009419:Nerve Tissue Proteins; D064231:Nestin; D016900:Neurofilament Proteins; D009418:S100 Proteins; D010751:Phosphopyruvate Hydratase