Figure 3

Vascular endothelial differentiation of mSSCs. (A) mRNA profiles of endothelial specific marker genes, VE-cadherin and CD31, in mSSCs and ESCs during in vitro vascular differentiation process. mRNA levels were measured using real-time RT-PCR and normalized as its relative ratio to GAPDH. The mRNA levels were expressed relative to the corresponding mRNA level at day 0 (undifferentiated mSSCs and ESCs; set as 1). The data were obtained from 3 independent preparations and are expressed as mean ± SEM. (B, C) Representative images showing the expression of VE-cadherin (B) and CD31(C) proteins in differentiated mSSCs (diff. mSSCs) and differentiated ESCs (diff. ESCs). On day 14 of in vitro vascular differentiation, cells were immunostained with anti-VE-cadherin, anti-CD31 or nonspecific control IgGs. Murine ECs were included as a positive control. Scale bar is 200 µm. Nuclei were stained with DAPI. (D) Representative FACS histograms showing the expression of CD31 in differentiated mSSCs (diff. mSSCs) and differentiated ESCs (diff. ESCs). Approximately 7% and 18% of differentiated cells from mSSCs and ESCs on day 14 were positive for CD31. Murine ECs were included as a positive control. Each histogram in (D) is a representative of three separate experiments.