Migration of Bone Marrow Cells Visualized by SPECT and PET

Wednesday, September 24, 2014 — Poster Session IV
10:00 a.m. –12:00 p.m.	FAES Academic Center	NCI	CANCER-2

* FARE Award Winner

Authors

• K.O. Asiedu
• G. Griffith
• P.L. Choyke
• N. Sato

Abstract

Bone marrow (BM) transplants are often used in the treatment of hematological malignancies. However, the fate of transferred cells is not well understood because of the lack of a monitoring system. We aimed to visualize and understand the trafficking of BM cells after transfer. We labeled BM cells with 89Zr-oxine or 111In-oxine, transferred intravenously to non-irradiated and irradiated mice, and imaged using positron emission tomography (PET) or single-photon emission tomography (SPECT). Surprisingly, a fraction of BM cells started to migrate to the BM immediately after the transfer, reaching ~20% within 4 hr. Treatment of mice with plerixafor, a CXCR4 antagonist, inhibited BM homing of the cells, suggesting that the labeled cells maintained chemotaxis function and that the BM homing depended on the CXCL12-CXCR4 system as reported. The migration pattern was similar between irradiated and non-irradiated hosts within 2 days. Flow cytometry analysis of the BM of these mice at 10 weeks revealed cell engraftments only in the irradiated mice. In conclusion, PET/SPECT presented a significant fraction of transferred BM cells migrated to the BM via the CXCL12-CXCR4 system. Initial homing occurred independent of BM ablation, however, cell engraftment required the ablation. PET/SPECT would be useful for visualizing BM cell migration.

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