Toward a serum-free, xeno-free culture system for optimal growth and expansion of hMSC suited to therapeutic applications

Background Human mesenchymal stem cells (hMSC) hold great promise as a tool in regenerative medicine and cell therapy. Application of hMSC in cell therapy requires the elaboration of an appropriate serum-free (SF), xeno-free (XF) culture system in order to minimize the health risk of using xenogenic compounds, and to limit the immunological reactions in-vivo. Besides the well-known disadvantages of serum, in comparison to a SF, XF culture system, serum also exhibits poor performance in the context of hMSC proliferation. In the present study, a novel SF, XF culture system for hMSC suitable for therapeutic applications was developed and evaluated. The SF, XF culture system includes specially developed solutions for attachment, dissociation, and freezing, as well as a culture medium, MSC NutriStem XF, that enables long-term growth of multipotent hMSC. Development of the SF, XF culture system was conducted on hMSC from a variety of sources: bone marrow (BM), adipose tissue (AT) and Wharton’s jelly (WJ).