Mechanical forces play critical roles in the development and remodeling processes of bone. As an alternative cell source for bone engineering, adipose-derived stem cells (ASCs) should be fully investigated for their responses to mechanical stress. Similarly, the osteogenic potential, stimulated by mechanical stress, should be compared with bone marrow stromal cells (BMSCs), which have been clinically used for bone tissue engineering. In this study, ASCs and BMSCs were osteogenic-induced for 48 hours, and then subjected to uniaxial mechanical stretching for 2 or 6 hours. Cell orientation, osteogenic regulatory genes, osteogenic genes and ALP activities were measured and compared between ASCs and BMSCs. ASCs could align in a perpendicular way to the direction of stretching stress, while BMSCs did not present a specific alignment. Both 2 and 6 hours mechanical stretching could enhance the mRNA expression of Osx and Runx2 in BMSCs and ASCs, while OCN mRNA only increased in ASCs after 6 hours mechanical loading. Mechanical stretching enhanced the BMP-2 mRNA expression in ASCs, while only after 6 hours of mechanical loading significantly increased the BMP-2 gene expression in BMSCs. Significant differences only exist between ASCs and BMSCs loaded at 2 hours of mechanical stretching. It is concluded that ASCs are more rapid responders to mechanical stress, and have greater potential than BMSCs in osteogenesis when stimulated by mechanical stretching, indicating their usefulness for bone study in a rat model. Keywords: mechanotransduction; stem cells; osteoblasts; adipocytes Bone Research (2013) 3: 282-290. doi: 10.4248/BR201303006
IntroductionBone mesenchymal stem cells (BMSCs) and adiposederived stem cells (ASCs) have both been used experimentally for gene therapy and tissue engineering applications ( 1-2). Currently, BMSCs are obtained by aspiration of 10-40 mL of bone marrow from the iliac crest, or at the time of bone marrow biopsy, and isolated by their adherence properties (3). ASCs can be obtained from subcutaneous adipose tissue by liposuction surgeries, and these procedures yield anywhere from 100 mL to 3L †These authors contributed equally to this work. Mechanical force is one of the fundamental biological factors that affect fracture healing and bone remodeling. Most studies report that mechanical stress promotes osteogenic differentiation of BMSCs or osteoblasts (14-21). Mechanical stress might also up-regulate the expression of osteogenic genes of ASC (22-25). Results from our previous study have shown that cyclic tensile mechanical loading of long duration could promote the expression of BMP-2 and Runx2 and thus, osteogenic differentiation of ASCs in osteogenic medium (26) or adipogenic medium (27). However, limited studies were found concerning a comparison of osteogenic potential, stimulated by mechanical stress between ASCs and BMSCs. Regarding the whole bone regeneration process being affected by mechanical stress, we determined that a comparison of osteogenic differentiation by mechanical stretching ...