Regulation of functional activity of bone marrow hemopoietic stem cells by erythroid cells in mice

Transplantation of erythroid and bone marrow cells to irradiated mice stimulated exogenous colony formation. Pretreatment of erythroid cells with specific rabbit antiserum to erythroblasts abolished this effect. The reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction revealed the presence of mRNA for interleukin-1α, interleukin-1β, interleukin-3, interleukin-6, and granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor in erythroid cells. Granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor was found in the conditioned medium from erythroid cells. Thus, erythroid cells stimulated colony-forming activity of bone marrow cells, which was probably mediated via cytokine synthesis (e.g., granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor).[PUBLICATION ABSTRACT]