Abstract:

BACKGROUND: The bone marrow cells are candidate approaches for inducing immunological tolerance.
OBJECTIVE: To explore effects of bone marrow cell transplantation on immunological tolerance in rat kidney transplantation.
METHODS: ①Forty Wistar rats, half males and half females, were randomly assigned into the control group (n=20) and experimental group (n=20). The female animals were injected bone marrow cell and normal salty in portal vein. After 30 days, the chimerism formation and rejection were observed by gross and under a light microscope. ②Living-related kidney transplantation comprised 5 pairs of living kidney transplantations (couples or relatives). Males served as donors and females were recipients. Tacrolimus was taken orally before operation. The donors were subcutaneous injected drugs to stimulate leukocyte growth. The leukocyte suspension liquid was collected, determined by flow cytometry and infused into recipients via peripheral vein. The procedure was repeated once after 10 days, and the transplantation was performed within 1 week. The renal function was examined after operation. Y gene fragment was determined after half years by fluorescence in situ hybridization. The control group received normal living-related kidney transplantation without bone marrow cells transplantation.
RESULTS AND CONCLUSION: The rejection was slightly in the animal experimental group, with positive chimerism. Four cases showed chimerism-positive in the living transplantation group, but only 1 chimerism-positive in the control group. It is suggested that bone marrow cell injection can induce immunological tolerance, which relates to the chimerism formation of donor bone marrow cells injection before the transplantation.