Morphofunctional Features of Hematopoietic Bone Marrow Progenitor Cells in Patients with Chronic Myeloid Leukemia in Long-Term Culture of Gel Diffusion Chambers In Vivo

The search for ways to support the long-term cultivation of hematopoietic stem cells, their expansion, and studies of long-term growth kinetics and interactions of cells in normal and malignant processes remain among some of the most challenging issues of stem cell research. Solving these problems is one of the most important tasks of cell biology, biotechnology, and regenerative medicine. The analysis of features of proliferation and differentiation of the bone marrow derived from the patients with chronic myeloid leukemia and normal bone marrow in long-term culture of the original gel diffusion chambers implanted in the abdominal cavity of laboratory animals was conducted. The suspension culture in chambers of original design in vivo, the method of determining hematopoietic progenitor cells in semiliquid agar in vitro, cytological, and statistical methods were used. The results of the cultivation showed that the bone marrow cells of chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) patients with a detected Ph chromosome had a significant proliferative potential up to the 30th day in the culture, which was twice the normal value. Further on, the colony-forming activity declined rapidly in contrast to normal bone marrow, where active hematopoiesis was maintained for up to 1.5 months. The peculiarities in cell differentiation in clones were manifested as the predominance of erythroid progenitor cells in CML, while granulocyte-macrophage progenitor cells predominated under normal conditions. Thus, the proposed cultural system of long-term support of hematopoiesis provides an approach for studying normal human hematopoiesis and opens up prospects for addressing the nature of the transformed population of cells in malignant diseases of the hematopoietic system.