TAT-mediated transduction of NF-Ya peptide induces the ex vivo proliferation and engraftment potential of human hematopoietic progenitor cells

Retroviral overexpression of NF-Ya, the regulatory subunit of the transcription factor NF-Y, activates the transcription of multiple genes implicated in hematopoietic stem cell (HSC) self-renewal and differentiation and directs HSCs toward self-renewal. We asked whether TAT-NF-Ya fusion protein could be used to transduce human CD34+ cells as a safer, more regulated alternative approach to gene therapy. Here we show that externally added recombinant protein was able to enter the cell nucleus and activate HOXB4, a target gene of NF-Ya, using real-time polymerase chain reaction RNA and luciferase-based protein assays. After TAT-NF-Ya transduction, the proliferation of human CD34+ cells in the presence of myeloid cytokines was increased 4-fold. Moreover, TAT-NF-Ya-treated human primary bone marrow cells showed a 4-fold increase in the percentage of huCD45+ cells recovered from the bone marrow of sublethally irradiated, transplanted NOD-Scid IL2Rγnull mice. These data demonstrate that TAT-peptide therapies are an alternative approach to retroviral stem cell therapies and suggest that NF-Ya peptide delivery should be further evaluated as a tool for HSC/progenitors ex vivo expansion and therapy.