[Research progress on immunologic mechanisms of mesenchymal stem cells for treatment of graft-versus-host disease].

Mesenchymal stem cells (MSC) are the non-hematopoietic stem cells with a multi-differentiation potentials, which has a low immunogenicity and immune regulation ability. MSC immune regulation ability is particularly important, such as MSC can inhibit the activation and proliferation of T, B lymphocytes, NK cells and dendritic cells (DC). Meanwhile, MSC is able to reconstruct the human hematopoietic microenvironment, improving the successful rate of hematopoietic stem cell transplantation. Graft versus host disease (GVHD) is the main factor causing hematopoietic stem cell transplantation-related mortality. Based on the above mentioned properties, MSCs are used to treat autoimmune diseases and GVHD, recently. Therefore, deep exploration of the cellular immune mechanisms of MSC to treat GVHD is particularly important. This review focuses on progress of research related to treatment of GVHD by MSC immune mechanisms and briefly summarizes the status of the clinical studies.