The gene expression profiles of human bone marrow stromal cells

Evidence suggests that the bone marrow microenvironment (niches) support hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs). The cell-cell interaction between bone marrow mesenchymal stromal cells (BMSCs) and HSCs plays a crucial role in hematopoiesis. The aging of BMSCs lead to decreased ability to maintain hematopoiesis. We used microarray to determine the age-related change of BMSCs. Human BMSCs of young (yBMSC s, age of donors: 19 and 20 years) and elderly (eBMSC s, age of donors: 68 and 72 years) donors were purchased from Lonza. BM samples were obtained from MM patients (age of donors: 62 and 77 years) in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki and using protocols approved by the research Ethics Committee of Tokyo Medical University (IRB No. 2648). BMSCs derived from MM patients (mmBMSCs) were isolated using the classical plastic adhesion method. Total RNA from each sample (yBMSCs, eBMSCs and mmBMSCs) was processed for hybridization onto GeneChip® human Gene 1.0 ST Array (Affymetrix) according to the manufacturer's protocol and scanned.