Treatment and Transfer of Emphysema by a New Bone Marrow Transplantation Method from Normal Mice to Tsk Mice and Vice Versa

¹ First Department of Pathology & Transplantation Center, Kansai Medical University, Moriguchi-City, Osaka, Japan
² First Department of Pathology & First Department of Internal Medicine, Kansai Medical University, Moriguchi-City, Osaka, Japan
³ Department of Biotechnology, Kyoto Institute of Technology, Sakyo-ku, Kyoto, Japan
⁴ First Department of Pathology, Kansai Medical University, Moriguchi-City, Osaka, Japan
⁵ First Department of Internal Medicine, Kansai Medical University, Moriguchi-City, Osaka, Japan
⁶ The Jackson Laboratory, Bar Harbor, Maine
⁷ First Department of Internal Medicine, Yamagata University School of Medicine, Iida-Nishi, Yamagata, Japan

^* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: ikehara{at}takii.kmu.ac.jp.

	Abstract

We have recently established a new bone marrow transplantation method, in which bone marrow cells are injected into the intra-bone marrow (IBM-BMT). In the present study, we examined using an animal model for emphysema (Tsk mouse) whether IBM-BMT could be used to treat emphysema in Tsk mice. IBM-BMT was carried out from C3H mice into Tsk mice (8 to 10 weeks old) that had already shown emphysema. Six months after transplantation, the lungs of all the Tsk mice treated with IBM-BMT [C3HTsk] showed similar structures to those of normal mice, whereas the [TskTsk] mice showed emphysema, as seen in age-matched Tsk mice. Next, we attempted to transfer emphysema from Tsk mice to C3H mice by IBM-BMT. Six months after the IBM-BMT, the [TskC3H] mice showed emphysema. These results strongly suggest that emphysema in Tsk mice originates from defects of stem cells in the bone marrow.