AccScience Publishing / IMO / Online First / DOI: 10.36922/imo.4924
SHORT COMMUNICATION

Coculture of umbilical cord-derived mesenchymal stem cells for differentiation into chondrocytes and Schwann cells

Kyoko Baba1,2* Yoshika Sugimoto1 Jumpei Wato1
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1 Department of Plastic Surgery and Aesthetic Surgery, Kitasato University School of Medicine, Kitasato, Minami-ku, Sagamihara, Kanagawa, Japan
2 Department of Plastic Surgery, Kitasato University Medical Center, Arai, Kitamoto, Saitama, Japan
Received: 24 September 2024 | Revised: 27 October 2024 | Accepted: 8 November 2024 | Published online: 17 December 2025
© 2025 by the Author(s). This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution -Noncommercial 4.0 International License (CC-by the license) ( https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ )
Abstract

Umbilical cord-derived mesenchymal stem cells (UC-MSCs) are reported to have features intermediate between those of fetal and adult mesenchymal cells. Hence, UC-MSCs were cocultured with chondrocytes and Schwann cells to induce differentiation because of their flexible differentiation potential. UC-MSCs were obtained from umbilical cords, and cells at the second passage were used in the experiments. Atelocollagen sponge was used as the scaffold for coculture; a horizontal, interactive coculture plate with a filter (pore size, 0.6 μm) was placed between the connected vessels. UC-MSCs were cocultured separately with chondrocytes and Schwann cells, and culture alone served as a control. Five weeks after induction of differentiation, each specimen was evaluated histologically. In the specimens cocultured with chondrocytes and the controls, cartilage tissues were detected using hematoxylin-eosin and toluidine blue staining. Cells positive for the S100 protein were detected in the specimens cocultured with Schwann cells, but not in the controls. UC-MSCs were easily induced to differentiate into chondrocytes and neural cells by coculture. This indicates that continuously shared humoral factors were effective in inducing differentiation of UC-MSCs. Thus, coculture may serve as a potentially useful technique for tissue regeneration using MSCs.

Keywords
Umbilical cord-derived mesenchymal stem cells
Coculture
Cell differentiation
Regenerative medicine
Chondrocytes
Schwann cells
Funding
This research was funded by a grant-in-aid for scientific research (C) 20K09871 from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, Japan.
Conflict of interest
The authors declare they have no competing interests.
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