Morphological Composition of Umbilical Cord Blood Cells and Their Functional Characteristics

By the 23d week of fetus development cell content of umbilical cord blood becomes similar to that of fetus. This may be advantageous for determining cell content of fetus blood. In this connection our study was focused on morphological and functional characteristics of hemapoietic progenitors of umbilical cord blood. Comparison of leucograms assessed with light microscopy and automatic cell counter showed that the latter when used alone was not reliable enough for reveling non-differentiating cells. Investigation of umbilical cord blood cells in methylcellulose culturing system revealed high amount of progenitors with prevalence to granulocyte and macrophage progenitors. Additionally, mononuclear fraction of umbilical cord blood cells was shown to contain high amount of GM-progenitors. The above data were compared through two cultural models such as culturing in "agar drop-liquid medium" and in methylcellulose. As a result, the two systems were suggested for growing and characterizing different types of progenitors being at different maturation stages.