Retrovirus-mediated gene transduction into canine peripheral blood repopulating cells

Genetically marked peripheral blood progenitor cells were used to investigate their contribution to long-term hematopoietic reconstitution after autologous marrow and peripheral blood cell transplantation. After autologous marrow harvest and cryopreservation, canine peripheral blood progenitor cells were mobilized in three dogs by treatment with recombinant canine stem cell factor for 8 days. Peripheral blood mononuclear cells were collected and enriched for major histocompatibility complex (MHC) class II antigen-positive cells by avidin-biotin immunoadsorption, thereby enriching for repopulating cells. Subsequently, the cells were cocultivated for 24 hours on irradiated vector-producing packaging cells (PA317/LN), followed by an 11-day incubation in a vector containing long-term marrow culture system. On the day of transplantation, the animals were irradiated with 9.2 Gy total body irradiation (TBI), and transduced peripheral blood cells and untransduced cryopreserved marrow cells were infused within 2 hours of TBI. All three dogs engrafted. Two dogs are long-term survivors showing intermittently G418-resistant marrow-derived colony-forming unit granulocyte-macrophage colonies at a median of 1% and 2%, respectively (range, 1% to 10%), for now up to 48 weeks after transplantation. Neo-specific sequences were detected by polymerase chain reaction in peripheral blood granulocytes for now up to 65 weeks and in peripheral blood lymphocytes for up to 75 weeks after transplantation. Peripheral blood samples of the dogs were free of helper virus and no side effects from the transduction were observed. One of the three dogs died from chronic canine distemper sclerosing encephalitis on day 84, whereas the other two dogs are alive at 15 and 17 months. Our data show successful retroviral transduction of canine peripheral blood repopulating cells. Long-term persistence of marked myeloid and lymphoid cells after transplantation suggests that peripheral blood contains repopulating cells that contribute to long-term hematopoietic reconstitution after otherwise lethal TBI.