Related Experiment Video
Updated: Aug 9, 2026
In Vitro and In Vivo Assessment of T, B and Myeloid Cells Suppressive Activity and Humoral Responses from Transplant Recipients
Published on: August 12, 2017
Noninvasive evaluation of immunosuppressive drug efficacy on acute donor cell survival
Olivier Gheysens1, Shuan Lin, Feng Cao
1Department of Radiology and Bio-X Program, Stanford University, Palo Alto, CA, USA.
Purpose:
The therapeutic benefits of cell transplantation may depend on the survival of sufficient numbers of grafted cells. We evaluate four potent immunosuppressive medications aimed at preventing acute donor cell death.
Procedures And Results:
Embryonic rat H9c2 myoblasts were stably transduced to express firefly luciferase reporter gene (H9c2-Fluc). H9c2-Fluc cells (3x10(6)) were injected into thigh muscles of Sprague-Dawley rats (N=30) treated with cyclosporine, dexamethasone, mycophenolate mofetil, tacrolimus, or saline from day -3 to day +14. Longitudinal optical bioluminescence imaging was performed over two weeks. Fluc activity was 40.0+/-12.1% (dexamethasone), 30.5+/-12.5% (tacrolimus), and 21.5+/-3.5% (mycophenolate) vs. 12.0+/-5.0% (control) and 8.3+/-5.0% (cyclosporine) at day 4 (P<0.05). However, by day 14, cell signals had decreased drastically to <10% for all groups despite drug therapy.
Conclusion:
This study demonstrates the ability of optical molecular imaging for tracking cell survival noninvasively and raises important questions with regard to the overall efficacy of immunosuppressives for prolonging transplanted cell survival.
