Submitted July 10, 2002
Accepted November 13, 2002
No difference in hemopoietic capacity on wild-type stroma between connexin43 wild-type or knock-out fetal liver cells
Martin Rosendaal* and Chris Jopling
Anatomy and Developmental Biology, UCL, London, United Kingdom
* Corresponding author; email: m.rosendaal{at}ucl.ac.uk.
In 1995 and 1997 we proposed that gap junctions between stromal and hemopoietic cells formed by connexin43 (Cx43) determine hemopoiesis. If this were the case, are the critical gap junctions in this regard those between hemopoietic and stromal cells, or those between stromal cells alone? To test the first possibility, we compared hemopoietic repopulating capacity between fetal liver hemopoietic cells expressing the different mouse Cx43 genotypes, wild-type (WT), hemizygous or knock-out (KO) on WT host mouse stroma. We deleted host Gpi-1a stems and then raced identifiable Cx43 WT host cells against congenic donor Cx43 WT, hemizygous or KO cells in sets, comparing their capacity to form five end cells. Hemopoietic capapcity did not differ between Cx43 WT and KO. The role of Cx43 gap junctions in hemopoiesis remains uncertain.
