No abstract

Summary:Telomere length of peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) from 23 autologous HSCT patients ranging from 4 to 61 years old, and 46 allogeneic HSCT recipients from 6 to 52 years old were studied to confirm whether excessive shortening of telomeres is associated with HSCT. After autologous HSCT, telomere length of PBMCs ranged from 6.

Summary:but can also suggest the replicative potential remaining in each cell.14 Recovery of the hematopoietic system after hematopoTelomeres are responsible for keeping the stability not only of chromosomes but also of genes. To investigate ietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) requires numerous replication cycles by HSCs. Such successive division of the effect of hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) on telomeres, we studied telomere length in the HSCs may affect the telomere length of their descendant cells. Since telomeres are important not only for the stabperipheral blood mononuclear cells of 31 children who received HSCT. In the auto-HSCT groups telomere ility of chromosomes and genes, but also for determining the fate of cells [15][16][17][18][19] we became interested in the effect of length ranged from 8.6 to 12.0 kb and in the allo-HSCT groups from 8.4 to 12.0 kb. Comparison of the telomere HSCT on telomere length. In this study, we assessed the effect of HSCT on telolength between before and after auto-HSCT showed shorting up to 1.0 kb. Moreover, comparison between mere length in children. We found that the telomere length of the HSCT patients was not significantly shorter than that donors and recipients in allo-HSCT revealed that telomeres of recipients were up to 1.0 kb shorter than those of age-matched putative normal controls, but telomere length was affected by donor age. of the donors. Patients who received allo-HSCT from donors older than 18 years had significantly shorter telomeres than those transplanted from donors under 18 years old (P Ͻ 0.05), indicating that donor age is an Patients and methods important factor for recipient's telomere length. These findings suggest that the effects which might be induced Patients by shortening of telomeres in recipients are within the Thirty-one children who underwent HSCT from 1983 to biologically tolerable range. However, if hematopoietic 1996 at Jikei University Hospital were studied. Two stem cells from elderly donors are transplanted into patients were treated with autologous bone marrow transyounger patients, the telomere length may become too plantation (auto-BMT), 11 patients received autologous short for acceptable lifetime risks of genetic instability peripheral blood stem cell transplantation (auto-PBSCT), in the recipient.and 18 patients underwent allogenic bone marrow transKeywords: hematopoietic stem cell transplantation; plantation (allo-BMT). No T cell-depleted stem cells were children; telomere length; chromosomal instability transplanted. The conversion to donor blood type was confirmed in allo-HSCTs by studying one or two of the following factors: the sex chromosome, the types of red blood Telomeres are special protein/DNA structures that cap the cells, and the types of HLA. The clinical characteristics of ends of linear eukaryotic chromosomes, preventing end-tothe patients are listed in Tables 1 and 2. The follow-up perend fusion and exonucleotic degradation.

Early treatment intensification did not compensate for a truncated phase of maintenance chemotherapy in children with standard- or high-risk ALL. However, 6 months of antimetabolite treatment seemed adequate for extremely high-risk patients who were good responders to prednisolone and received intensified chemotherapy that included high-dose cytarabine early in the clinical course.