By using CFU-GM/CFU-L colony assay, NBT/MTT reductant test and DNA fragmentation analysis, we studied the effects of Sophora flavescens (SF) on CFU-GM proliferative ratio in human normal bone marrow/umbilical cord blood and on proliferation, differentiation and apoptosis in human acute myelogenous leukemia HL-60 cells. The results showed that 5, 10, 15, 20 micrograms.microliter-1 of SF significantly inhibited proliferation and induced apoptosis in the HL-60 cells in a dose-dependent fashion. Fifteen micrograms.microliter-1 of SF also induced differentiation in HL-60 cells. Furthermore, cytotoxic activity of SF(5-15 micrograms.microliter-1) was not apparent on human normal hematopoietic progenitors(CFU-GM). The results indicate that an appropriate concentration of SF has a selective antileukemic effect. Thus, these are important impetuses for further research of SF as an anticancer agent.

For in vitro studies, both CD34+ selected cell and mononuclear cell (MNC) can be used to expand hematopoietic stem/progenitor cells. To investigate the expansion characteristics of mononuclear cells (MNC) and CD34+ selected cells the two cell fractions were cultured in the medium containing cytokine cocktails of SCF + IL-3 + IL-6 + FL + Tpo. It was found that the CD34+ selected cells had presented a high proliferation potential. The expansion of CD34+ selected cells could be maintained for 8 weeks while that of MNCs declined after 4 weeks. During the culture period, the maximum expansion of total cells in CD34+ selected cell culture achieved 31,270.9 +/- 8640.5 times, while that of MNC reached 50.9 +/- 8.2 times only. In the culture of MNCs, the colony density and the proportion of CD34+ cells increased from day 0 to day 7. However, in the culture of CD34+ selected cells, both the colony density and the proportion of CD34+ cells declined continuously during the whole culture period. During the ex vivo culture of CD34+ selected cells, the maximum expansion of CFU-GM and CD34+ cells achieved 185.7 +/- 14.1 fold and 191.7 +/- 188.8 fold, respectively. They are much higher than that of MNC, which were 12.4 +/- 3.2 fold and 50.6 +/- 33.2 fold only. While the BFU-E of both cell fractions only expanded by few times, which were 7.2 +/- 5.2 and 10.1 +/- 3.4 times, respectively. The results showed that the CD34+ selected cells culture could obtain more CFU-GM cells and CD34+ cells during the whole culture period.

To review the recent research progress of bone-marrow stromal stem cells (BMSCs) in the conditions of culture in vitro, chondrogenic differentiation, and the application in cartilage tissue engineering.

To study the relationship between targeting vector structure and homologous recombination rate and investigate whether the mouse p16(INK4a) plays a role in tumor suppression.

To study the regulation effects of Momordica saponins on endocrine function in senile mice.

Derivation of human embryonic stem cell and embryonic germ cell lines has widespread and far-reaching significance on human basic research and transplantation therapies. Human pluripotential stem cells provide an exciting new model for studying early human embryogenesis, understanding normal human development and abnormal development, provide a powerful system for discovering human novel genes and testing their function, offer new strategies for discovering of novel growth factors and medicines and promise a renewable source of cells for tissue transplantation, cell replacement and gene therapies. Research history of establishment of human ES and EG cell lines is reviewed. Several methods of establishment of these cell lines involving in the protocol, route, significance and possibility are discussed. Selection of the feeder layer, medium, and supplemental cytokines and their roles in establishing and maintaining human ES and EG cell lines at present are illustrated in detail systematically. Effects and used methods of several kinds of digestive en-zyme in propagations are prepared. Several methods for identifying human ES and EG cells are summarized. At the end, some key problems which are urgent to resolve in these studies at present are put forward and analyzed.

Several methods and processes of establishment and culture of BALB/c mouse ES cell lines were discussed detailedly. A new method to establish and culture ES cell lines derived from BALB/c mouse was set up successfully using mouse embryonic fibroblast feeder layer and rat-heart-cell-conditioned medium (RH-CM). These culture conditions not only maintain the undifferentiated state and normal diploid karyotypes of BALB/c mouse ES cells effectively, but also maintain a series of their characteristics of murine stem cells. two different kinds of digestive methods and Two kinds of digestive juice with different concentrations were designed to dissociate proliferous inner cell mass (ICM) and ES cell colonies derived from dissociative ICM. two different kinds of digestive methods are "single time dissociation method" and "several times dissociation method", two kinds of digestive juice are 0.25% Trypsin-0.04% EDTA and 0.05% Trypsin-0.008% EDTA. At the same time, appropriate dissociated occasion of ICM and the effect of RH-CM on establishment and culture of BALB/c mouse ES cell lines were discussed. The results suggested that it is a reasonable method to establish BALB/c mouse ES cell lines using low concentration digestive juice and "several times dissociation method" to dissociate ICM after 4 days' proliferation. Judged by the form of ES cells and its colonies, proliferous capability, karyotypes examine, alkaline phosphatase activity assay and differentiation capability in vitro and in vivo, the 9 ES cell lines that we established satisfied the all traits of murine ES cell line.

To observe the effect of cytosine arabinoside (Ara-C) combined with recombinant human granulocyte colony-stimulating factor (rhG-CSF) on mobilization of autologous peripheral blood stem cells (APBSCs) among malignant lymphoma patients and investigate appropriate dose of Ara-C.

To cultivate human mesenchymal stem cells (MSC) derived from fetal bone marrow and examine their pluripotentiality.

To explore the hematopoietic and immunologic reconstitution and transplantation-related complications of HLA one locus mismatched unrelated umbilical cord blood transplantation for the treatment of hematological malignancies.

To observe the influence of decreasing conditioning regimen intensity on the engraftment of HLA haplotype peripheral blood stem cell transplantation.

To explore a new method of alleviating graft-versus-host disease (GVHD) after allogeneic bone marrow transplantation (allo-BMT) through selected elimination of mouse alloreactive T cells (ARTC) by Fas-Fas ligand (FasL) passway.

To explore the regulatory effects of hTERT and TEP1 on telomerase activity in hematopoiesis.

To investigate the tumorigenic mechanisms of human leukemia cell line HL60-n in nude mice.

To investigate the stroma-independent growth ability, multilineage differentiation and expansion of the single hematopoietic stem/progenitor cell from patients with paroxysmal nocturnal hematoglobinuria (PNH).

To evaluate the long-term outcome of immunosuppressive therapy (IST) in patients with severe aplastic anemia (SAA).

To evaluate the effects of biopsy methods, biopsy timing and the number of cell removed on in vitro development of embryos.

To explore the efficacy, safety and immune reconstitution of autologous peripheral blood stem cell transplantation (APBSCT) using T cell depleted grafts in the treatment of refractory rheumatoid arthritis (RA).

To investigate the expression and function of P-glycoprotein (P-gp), an efflux pump encoded by multidrug resistance complementary DNA (MDR1), in human mononuclear cells (MNCs) transfected with MDR1 mRNA.

To isolate, cultivate and identify the neural stem cells from the cortex of embryo mouse in vitro for the further related research.