Comparing adult human periodontal ligament and dental pulp derived MSCs: colony forming unit fibroblast assay and flow cytometry

The current study was performed on adult human impacted third molars where aim of the study was to compare mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) from cultures of periodontal ligament (PDL) and human dental pulp. The clonogenic potential of the isolated cells in both groups; group I (PDL) and group II (pulp) was assessed via Colony forming unit-fibroblast (CFU-F) Assay. The percentage of cells in both groups positive to cell surface markers CD146 and CD 34 were analyzed and sorted by Flow cytometry. The morphologic characteristics of the MSCs were similar for PDL derived and dental pulp derived. Generally, the MSCs isolated from both tissues showed ?broblastic morphology. However, the growth rate of the MSCs was slightly different where dental pulp derived cells showed a slightly increased rate of proliferation versus PDL derived ones. CFU-F Assays of both tissues showed slight increase in the colony counts for dental pulp derived MSCs when comparing the output in PDL derived MSCs. However, this difference was proven statistically insignificant using student (t) test. Flow cytometry revealed that cells in both groups were negative for hematopoietic markers CD (34) and were positive for the CD (146). Based on their CFU-F assay and flow cytometry results both tissues didn’t show significant statistical difference.