Fetal stromal niches enhance human embryonic stem cell-derived hematopoietic differentiation and globin switch.

Hematopoiesis during mammalian embryonic development has been perceived as a migratory phenomenon, from the yolk sac blood island to the aorta-gonad-mesonephros (AGM) region, fetal liver (FL), and subsequently, the fetal bone marrow. In this study, we investigated the effects of primary stromal cells from fetal hematopoietic niches and their conditioned media (CM), applied singly or in sequential orders, on induction of human embryonic stem cells, H1, H9, and H14 lines, to hematopoietic cells. Our results demonstrated that stromal support of FL, AGM + FL, and AGM + FL + fetal bone marrow significantly increased the proliferation of embryoid bodies (EB) at day 18 of hematopoietic induction in the presence of thrombopoietin, stem cell factor, and Flt-3 ligand.