In vitro angiogenic performance and in vivo brain targeting of magnetized endothelial progenitor cells for neurorepair therapies.

Unlabelled: Endothelial progenitor cells (EPCs) represent a promising approach for cell-based therapies to induce tissue repair; however, their effective delivery into the brain has remained a challenge. We loaded EPCs with superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticles (SPIONs), assessed their angiogenic potential and evaluated their guidance to the brain using an external magnet. SPIONs were stored in the cytoplasm within endosomes/lysosomes as observed by transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and could be visualized as hypointense signals by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) T2-weighted images.