Maintenance of functional human cancellous bone and human hematopoiesis in NOD/SCID mice

Attempts were made to establish models to study interactions between marrow stromal cells and hematopoietic cells in vivo. The approach was to create a NOD-SCID-hu murine model of long-term human hematopoiesis by implantation of a human adult bone fragment. Nine to 12 weeks posuransplantation, human CD45(+) cells were detected in the blood and the spleen of some mice. The histology of the human transplant showed that human bone fragment was viable at 9 weeks. Moreover, vessels of human origin, as assessed by immunohistochemical detection of human beta(2)-microglobulin, were observed in the mouse tissue surrounding the transplanted human fragment.