Figure 5.

Self-renewal and differentiation capacity of transplanted PαS cells. Wild-type B6 animals were intravenously transplanted with freshly isolated 10⁴ PαS cells. (A) Representative result from flow cytometric analysis of EGFP expression of BMMNCs in recipient mice (n = 5 mice in three independent experiments) at 16 wk after transplantation. (B) PαS cells from five recipients were then single sorted by flow cytometry and cultured individually in 96-well tissue culture plates. Bar, 50 µm. Colonies were formed by the sorted single PαS, which were able to sustain proliferation in vitro. Bar, 100 µm. (C) GFP⁺ PαS clones derived from transplanted PαS were multipotent and could give rise to adipocytes (left; oil red O staining, day 14), chondrocytes (middle; toluidine blue staining, day 21), and osteocytes (right; alkaline phosphatase staining, day 14). Bar, 100 µm.