Caratterizzazione fenotipica e potenzialità differenziative delle cellule isolate dalle membrane fetali di placenta umana a termine

The work here presented is a part of a bigger project at the Centro di Ricerca E. Menni (Fondazione Poliambulanza, Istituto Ospedaliero, Brescia), aimed to identify new adult stem cells sources. In these last years, in order to find a tissue easy to procure and that allows to obtain high cell yeld researchers have turned their attention to alternative sources of adult stem cells as adipose tissue, peripheral blood, cord blood and, more recently, placenta tissue. In this field, placenta is of particular interest either because of its immunological role in maintaining fetus-maternal tolerance either because of its early embryological origin which may entail an immature phenotype. In particular we are focusing our attention on fetal membranes, amnion and chorion, which form the outer limit of the sac that encloses the fetus. The amnion is an unique avascular tissue and is comprised of an epithelial monolayer on the top of a mesodermal layer. The amniotic mesoderm is loosely connected to the chorionic mesoderm, in contact to the trophoblastic layer which is in intimate contact with the maternal decidua. The aim of this study was to isolate different cell populations from the 4 layers which costitute the fetal membranes, evaluating all the features that contribute to hypothesize the presence of stem cells. In particular the phenotypic profile and the differentiation potential toward mesodermal lineages of the different cell populations were evaluated, in comparison with bone marrow stromal cells.