Immunosuppression Agent Cyclosporine Reduces Self-Renewal and Vessel Regeneration Potentiation of Human Endothelial Colony Forming Cells

Endothelial colony forming cells (ECFC) and mesenchymal stem cells (MSC) combined have great potential to be used for cell therapy of ischemic vascular diseases. However, to improve allogeneic stem cell engraftment the use of immunosuppression, such as cyclosporine has been suggested. Our aim was to assess the impact of cyclosporine on hind limb revascularisation upon MSC and ECFC combination therapy. Balb/c immunocompetent mice subjected to hind limb ischemia (right femoral artery ligation) were given both human ECFC and MSC (weekly intramuscular injections) with or without cyclosporine (daily injection). Surprisingly, mice receiving cyclosporine had a significant decrease in reperfusion based on laser Doppler imaging compared to vehicle controls and had poorer limb survival. In vitro, the downstream calcineurin target NFATC4 was highly expressed in the self-renewing fraction of ECFCs. ECFCs cultured with cyclosporine had reduced colony formation capacity and tube formation in Matrigel. Lastly, ECFC displayed increased proliferation and loss of capacity for long term culture when in the presence of cyclosporine clearly showing a loss of quiescence and progenitor function. Our findings demonstrate the deleterious impact of cyclosporine on ECFC function, with significant impact on ECFC-based allogeneic cellular therapy. Stem Cells Translational Medicine 2019;8:162&7