Expression Of Cell Surface Oligosaccharides LeX/Y And FUT4 Is Increased During The Neural Differentiation Of Human Bone Marrow Mesenchymal Stem Cells In Vitro

Cell surface oligosaccharide antigens LeX (Lewis X) and LeY (Lewis Y) are involved in a variety of biological processes, such as cell-cell and cell -matrix interactions, differentiation, proliferation, apoptosis and oncogenic transformation, etc. However, it is not clear that whether these fucosylated glycans play the functional roles during the differentiation of adult stem cells into neural cells. In present study, we investigated the expression of LeX, LeY, fucosyltransferase I (FUT1) and fucosyltransferase IV (FUT4) (FUT4 for LeX synthesis, FUT1 and FUT4 for LeY) in the course of neural differentiation of human bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (hBMMSCs) in vitro. By detection of the morphology, mRNA and specific proteins expression of neural markers, our results showed that hBMMSCs were able to rapidly differentiate into neuron-like cells with a novel three-step protocol. Then, analysis of flow cytometry and immuno-fluorescence indicated that the expression of LeX and LeY antigens was enhanced on the cell surface during neural differentiation. Moreover, we also assessed the expression levels of FUT1 and FUT4. The similar change tendency was revealed in the expression of FUT4, while the change of FUT1 was not significant by RT-PCR, flow cytometry and immuno-fluorescence. These results suggested that LeX and LeY played important functional roles during the neural differentiation, and FUT4 might be the main enzyme responsible for the increased expression of LeX and LeY. Taken together, this study might provide a new way to explore the neural differentiation mechanism of hBMMSCs in vitro.