Extracellular vesicles from human urine-derived stem cells prevent osteoporosis by transferring CTHRC1 and OPG.
basic_science · Level V
Where this comes from
- Record sourced from PubMed, PMID 31263627.
- Also identified by DOI 10.1038/s41413-019-0056-9 and PMC identifier 6594995.
- Licence recorded as CC BY.
- The licence permits redistribution, so the abstract is shown in full and the full text is available from the publisher.
Abstract
Osteoporosis is a debilitating bone disease affecting millions of people. Here, we used human urine-derived stem cells (USCs), which were noninvasively harvested from unlimited and easily available urine, as a "factory" to obtain extracellular vesicles (USC-EVs) and demonstrated that the systemic injection of USC-EVs effectively alleviates bone loss and maintains bone strength in osteoporotic mice by enhancing osteoblastic bone formation and suppressing osteoclastic bone resorption. More importantly, the anti-osteoporotic properties of USC-EVs are not notably disrupted by the age, gender, or health condition (with or without osteoporosis) of the USC donor. Mechanistic studies determined that collagen triple-helix repeat containing 1 (CTHRC1) and osteoprotegerin (OPG) proteins are enriched in USC-EVs and required for USC-EV-induced pro-osteogenic and anti-osteoclastic effects. Our results suggest that autologous USC-EVs represent a promising novel therapeutic agent for osteoporosis by promoting osteogenesis and inhibiting osteoclastogenesis by transferring CTHRC1 and OPG.