Long-Term Effect of Mesenchymal Stromal Cell Derived Extracellular Vesicles on the Restoration of Engraftment of Stem Cells in Radiation Exposed Mice

Extracellular vesicles (EVs) including exosomes and microvesicles, have been found to deliver both mRNA and transcriptional modulators to target cells and affect their phenotype. Vesicles derived from mesenchymal stem cells (MSC) have been shown to affect the phenotype and induce healing of many different cell types. Our recent published work has shown that pretreated irradiated murine bone marrow stem cells with human or murine MSC-EV in vitro, could significantly improve the engraftment capacity of radiation-damaged stem cells up to 9 months post-transplantation. Interestingly, the restoration of engraftment was not significantly observed within the first month of post-transplant, the predominant reversal effect occurred on later period of post-transplant from 3 months up to 9 months. This is indicating a long-term effect of MSC-EVs on reversal of radiation damage of stem cell engraftment capacity. To confirm this hypothesis, in our current study, the effect of human MSC-EVs on reversal of engraftment capacity of bone marrow stem cells post-radiation was investigated by an in vivo study. C57BL/6 mice were exposed to 500 cGy total body irradiation. MSC-EVs or vehicle were then injected intravenously 24, 48 and 72 hours after irradiation. The whole bone marrow were harvested at 6, 12, 26 and 53 weeks post EV-injection and then transplanted into 950 cGy exposed B6.SJL mice and engraftment evaluated at 1 and 3 months post-transplantation. In those transplanted mice at 6 weeks post-EV injection, there was slight increase in the restoration of engraftment rate (the percent of irradiated mice with EV/Vehicle treatment engraftment rate compared to healthy non-irradiated mice engraftment rate) in EV treated mice (17.58±2.32% compared to untreated mice (13.80±1.41%) after 1 month post-transplantation. However, for those mice transplanted at 12, 26, and 53 weeks post-EV injection, there were the significant higher restorations of engraftment rate in EV treated mice (40.48±6.03%, 33.93±3.76%, and 56.62±3.635) compared to untreated mice (12.39±1.30%, 15.14±2.21%, 36.21±3.63%) after 1 month transplantation respectively. The similar restorations of engraftment were also seen in 3 months post-transplantation. Our study also showed that there was a significant inhibition of stem cell engraftment at 53 weeks post 500cGy whole body radiation mice which was 36.21±3.63% of engraftment rate from healthy mice. Thus our data suggest that there is a long-term effect of MSC-EVs on the restoration of engraftment of stem cells in radiation-exposed mice.