Age-related immunophenotypic characteristics of perivascular mesenchymal stem cells in patients with heart defects

BACKGROUND: Currently, there are only a few studies evaluating the role of perivascular mesenchymal stem cells in the pathogenesis of cardiovascular diseases. Heart defects are a broad category of conditions affecting people of all ages. Therefore, biological characteristics of perivascular mesenchymal stem cells may be relevant to this area of research. The expression profile of surface markers is a key characteristic of cells that represents their functional state. This work evaluated and compared immunophenotypic characteristics of perivascular mesenchymal stem cells obtained from patients of different ages with heart defects of various non-inflammatory origins. AIM: The study aimed to evaluate morphotypes and immunophenotypes of perivascular mesenchymal stem cells in pediatric and elderly patients with heart defects of various origins. METHODS: The study included 16 patients of various ages with heart defects. Mesenchymal stem cells were isolated from perivascular adipose tissue and cultured. The levels of the following surface markers expressed by these cells were evaluated using flow cytofluorimetry for passages 2–4: CD90, CD105, CD73, CD34, and HLA-DR. RESULTS: Only 47.97% of the cells in passage 2 in the pediatric group expressed specific surface markers. However, the number of cells showing a perivascular mesenchymal stem cell phenotype increased with each further passage (p = 0.0016). The subcultivation of perivascular mesenchymal stem cells obtained from older patients revealed that, in passage 2, 95.98% of the cells had specific surface markers, which decreased to 44.59% by passage 4 (p = 0.0016). CONCLUSION: The expression of the study surface markers (CD90, CD105, CD73, CD34, HLA-DR) was less significant in perivascular mesenchymal stem cells obtained from older patients with non-inflammatory heart defects than in cells obtained from children with similar defects.