Fig. 3.

Multipotentcy of NCSC and MSC from adult bone marrow. NCSC clones were able to differentiate into chondrocytes (b) and melanocytes (d), but unable to differentiate into adipocytes (a) and smooth muscle cells (c). Adipocytes are labeled with Oil-Red O, chondrocytes with Blue toluidine, smooth muscle cells with anti-SMA and melanocytes with anti-Trp2 antibody. Likewise, only MSC clones were able to differentiate into osteocytes (i) quantified by the alkaline phosphatase activity measurement. Interestingly, when pre-treated with Wnt1 and BMP2, NCSC were able to differentiate into adipocytes (j). NCSC and MSC clones were cultivated for 10 days in serum-containing medium: DEM/F12 + 10% FBS. In those conditions, NCSC clones were able to spontaneously differentiate into Tuj1- (green, k) and GFAP- (green, l) positive cells, where no differentiation was observed for MSC clones (o, p). We then placed NCSC and MSC clones in neurotrophin-containing medium (DEM/F12 + BDNF + NT3 + NGF). In those conditions, we obtained Tuj1- (green, m) and GFAP- (green, n) positive cells with NCSC clones, where only few GFAP-positive cells (green, r), but no Tuj1-positive cells (q) were obtained with MSC clones. Nuclei were counterstained with Dapi (blue). Scale bars 30 μm. Scale bars (b, f) 50 μm