The Endothelial Antigen ESAM Marks Hematopoietic Stem Cells throughout Life

Hematopoietic stem cells (HSC) are an important cell type with the capacity for self-renewal as well as differentiation into multi-lineage blood cells, maintaining the immune system throughout life. Many studies have attempted to identify unique markers associated with these extremely rare cells. In bone marrow of adult mice, the Lin-c-kitHi Sca1+ CD34−/Lo Thy1.1Lo subset is known to include HSC with long-term repopulating capacity. However, several of these parameters differ between strains of mice, change dramatically during developmental age and/or are expressed on many non-HSC during inflammation. Efficient HSC-based therapies and the emerging field of regenerative medicine will benefit from learning more about what defines stem cells. We previously determined that the most primitive cells with lymphopoietic potential first develop in the paraaortic splanchnopleura/aorta-gonad-mesonephros (AGM) region of embryos using Rag1/GFP knock-in mice. We also reported that Rag1/GFP-c-kitHi Sca1+ cells derived from E14.5 fetal liver (FL) reconstituted lympho-hematopoiesis in lethally irradiated adults, while Rag1/GFPLo c-kitHi Sca1+ cells transiently contributed to T and B lymphopoiesis. To extend those findings, microarray analyses were conducted to search for genes that characterize the initial transition of fetal HSC to primitive lymphopoietic cells. The comparisons involved mRNA from Rag1Lo ckitHi Sca1+, early lymphoid progenitors (ELP) and the HSC-enriched Rag1-ckitHi Sca1+ fraction isolated from E14.5 FL. While genes potentially related to early lymphopoiesis were discovered, our screen also identified genes whose expression seemed to correlate with HSC. Among those, endothelial cell-selective adhesion molecule (ESAM) attracted attention because of its conspicuous expression in the HSC fraction and sharp down-regulation on differentiation to ELP. ESAM was originally identified as an endothelial cell-specific protein, but expression on megakaryocytes and platelets was also reported (J. Biol. Chem., 2001, 2002). Flow cytometry analyses with anti-ESAM antibodies showed that the HSC-enriched Rag1-c-kitHi Sca1+ fraction could be subdivided into two on the basis of ESAM levels. The subpopulation with the high density of ESAM was enriched for c-kitHi Sca1Hi cells, while ones with negative or low levels of ESAM were found in the c-kitHi Sca1Lo subset. Among endothelial-related antigens on HSC, CD34 and CD31/PECAM1 were uniformly present on Rag1-c-kitHi Sca1+ cells in E14.5 FL and neither resolved into ESAMHi and ESAM−/Lo fractions. Expression profiles of Endoglin and Tie2 partially correlate with ESAM. The primitive ESAMHi fraction uniformly expressed high levels of Endoglin and Tie2, but many of the more differentiated ESAM−/Lo cells still retained the two markers. ESAM expression correlated well with HSC activity. Cells in the ESAMHi Rag1-ckitHi Sca1+ fraction formed more and larger colonies than those in the ESAM-/Lo Rag1-ckitHi Sca1+ fraction. Particularly, most CFU-Mix, primitive progenitors with both myeloid and erythroid potential, were found in the ESAMHi fraction. In limiting dilution stromal cell co-cultures, we found that 1 in 2.1 ESAMHi Rag1-ckitHi Sca1+ cells and 1 in 3.5 ESAM−/Lo Rag1-ckitHi Sca1+ cells gave rise to blood cells. However, while only 1 in 125 ESAM−/Lo Rag1-ckitHi Sca1+ cells were lymphopoietic under these conditions, 1 in 8 ESAMHi Rag1-ckitHi Sca1+ cells produced CD19+ B lineage cells. In long-term reconstituting assays, ESAMHi Rag1-ckitHi Sca1+ cells contributed highly to the multi-lineage recovery of lympho-hematopoiesis in recipients, but no chimerism was detected in mice transplanted with ESAM−/Lo Rag1-ckitHi Sca1+ cells. These results suggested that HSC in E14.5 FL are exclusively present in the ESAMHi fraction. Tie2+ c-kit+ lympho-hematopoietic cells of E10.5 AGM also expressed high levels of ESAM. Furthermore, ESAM expression in adult bone marrow was detected on primitive progenitors and cells in the side population within the Lin-ckitHi Sca1+ fraction. Interestingly, the expression was up-regulated in aged mice. Based on these observations, we conclude that ESAM marks HSC throughout life in mice. We also observed that many of human cord blood CD34+ CD38− cells express ESAM, suggesting potential application for the purification of human HSC.