Germinative Testicular Cells and Bone Marrow Mononuclear Cells Transplanted to a Rat Model of Testicular Degeneration

Abstract

The aim of this study was to evaluate the ability of rat mononuclear bone marrow cells to recover testis cell associations and multiplication in busulfan-treated rats, and to compare these data to germinative testicular cell transplant. The germinative testicular cells were obtained by the trypsin digestion method, and bone marrow cells were harvested from femurs and tibias, and purified using by Ficoll gradient. Cell transplantation was performed by the injection of cells through the efferent ducts into the rete testis in busulfan-treated animals. Fifteen days after transplantation, the recipient rats were sacrificed and the testes were collected and analyzed by histology (hematoxilin-eosin and DAPI staining). Results demonstrated that germ cells transplantation promoted cellular reorganization of seminiferous epithelium 15 days later. On the other hand, no improvement in spermatogenesis regeneration was found after heterologous mononuclear bone marrow cell transplantation.

Transplantation of Autologous Bone Marrow Mesenchymal Stem Cells into the Testes of Infertile Male Rats and New Germ Cell Formation

“…Transplantation studies on the effects of MSCs on reconstruction of testicular germinal epithelium in infertile male animals, showed a number of promising results. Some studies reported that MSCs had no positive effects on regeneration of germinal epithelium, nor could differentiate into GCs in the testis (25, 26). However others reported that transplanted MSCs not only had the potency for differentiation into GCs (28), but also they could fully differentiate into sperm and regenerate spermatogenesis (27, 29).…”

“…Although, no study reported similar quantitative data, in total, controversial reports existed regarding the viability of MSCs after transplantation into testes. A group of researchers have stated that MSCs could not survive in the testis (25), whereas others have shown that MSCs were alive 2 months after transplantation (27–29). This finding showed that, transplanted BM-MSCs decreased (died and absorbed) with progression of time.…”

“…Some in vitro studies on MSCs from different species have shown that under appropriate conditions and with proper inducers, MSCs had the capability to differentiate into male GCs (13, 18–24). Although a number of researchers believe that MSCs do not impact regeneration of testicular gametogenesis in infertile animal models (25, 26), other studies have shown that MSCs positively affect reconstruction of germinal epithelium and restoration of fertility (27–30). …”

“…Results were compared between three groups. Any of the previously stated studies used autologous stem cells for transplantation and none of them also reported quantitative information about the fate of transplanted MSCs (25, 27–29). Moreover, in any of them the fate of transplanted cells was assessed and compared in different periods of time after transplantation.…”

Preparation of infertile male rabbits by local electron beam irradiation for intratesticular transplantation of autologous bone marrow stem cells

“…Within two weeks, cultured BMSCs had proliferated to reach 80-90% confluence. Therefore, the shape of the proliferation curves obtained had an inverted "S" shape ( Figure 4), based on the slow proliferation that occurred 0-2 days after inoculation, followed by a period of exponential growth over days [8][9][10][11][12][13]. Consistent with the morphology of the 12 Gy-treated cells versus control cells, the rates of cell proliferation were also found to be similar for cells from group D versus group E (Figure 4).…”